by Sean Oswald
He walked as fast as proper decorum would allow through the halls of justice disguised as a courthouse in desperate need of updating and repair. But hey, this was rural Illinois, so who was he to complain? Crunching the numbers in his head to figure out which inning of his son’s ballgame he could make it for, he almost ran into Judge Turnbough. A quick pivot around and an even quicker blurted, “Sorry your honor, late for my son’s ballgame,” got him a nod and a sourly muttered, “Just don’t kill anyone in your rush.”
After crossing the exit at the security checkpoint, Dave increased the length of his stride, taking the front stairs of the once majestic courthouse two at a time. He had promised that he wouldn’t miss this game. His son’s team was playing for a chance to progress onto the championship game, and Dave optimistically figured that out of a couple dozen games this season, he had seen maybe a dozen innings of his son’s play. Guilt and self-recrimination actually make very poor motivators and fought with his core belief that his job was the most important thing he could do for his family. Cutting across the grass on the east side of the courthouse, heading for the parking lot, Dave started stripping off the suit coat from his six-foot frame. The jacket hung over his shoulder revealing a belly that is bigger than it used to be and just starting to hang over the edge of his belt. Reaching his car, he threw in his case file and suit coat, sitting down as he loosened his tie, pulling it off and over his head of brown hair, which was much thinner than he liked. Settling into auto-pilot, he set off on this familiar trek across town to his son’s school where the game was being played.
As he drove, his thoughts wandered past the drain of the day and started thinking toward what needed to be accomplished this evening. He hoped to catch at least the last couple of innings of the ball game. Then likely, his wife, Emily, would ask him to pick up something for dinner on his way home. Gone were the days when Friday night was date night. When he and Emily would get a sitter for the kids and find something fun to do. No more concerts or movies or even quiet dinners at a nice restaurant. It wasn’t that he didn’t still love his wife. She was the core of his life, such a stable part of him that he couldn’t imagine himself without her; but for all of that, he didn’t have butterflies in his stomach when he thought about her. If his stomach had any flutters centered around Emily now, it was more likely because his stomach was churning, waiting to hear what new problem there was at home, how he wasn’t spending enough time with this child or that, or dealing with her frequent, “How does this outfit make me look” questions.
Dave liked to think of himself as the quintessential family man. A hard worker who provided well for his family, though there was never enough with braces, college funds, piano lessons, and a myriad of sports activities for the kids. Not to say anything about Emily’s love of redecorating the house or buying hundreds of dollars of flowers for the yard each Spring. He didn’t feel like Emily was frivolous, but he did feel that she had a different set of values about what to spend money on than he did. He tried his best to always be there for his kids but always felt like he came up short.
Despite his view of himself as a family man, what really excited him was the MMO games he played--the time spent questing, grinding, or raiding with online friends that he would never meet in person. Even now, as he rushed across town to fulfill a fatherly promise, his mind was focusing on what he hoped would be productive gaming time tonight. He needed to be done with daddy duties by 7:00 p.m. so that he could join in a planned raid. His guild had been working for weeks to complete a chain of quests that gave them a key to open up a portal to face the Ice Queen. Most of the guild wanted to start an hour earlier but he had begged them to delay the start time as long as possible to give him time to join in. He needed to get to the game, pick up dinner, and check in at home with his wife and two daughters before politely bowing out to join thirty-five guildmates in the culmination of the last few weeks of effort. He just hoped that Emily didn’t try to throw a monkey wrench into his plans.
On that note, he pulled into the parking lot outside the baseball stadium behind his son’s middle school, hunting for a parking spot and lucking out, finding a spot close to the entrance gate. Finally, something was going right today. Maybe this was a sign the rest of his night would flow smoothly. Stepping out of the car and absently hitting the lock button, Dave strode quickly through the gate and started up the aluminum bleachers to find a spot where he could see the game. He saw that his son was playing at third and a quick glance at the scoreboard showed that they were in the top of the last inning with his son’s team boasting a comfortable lead. The next pitch led to the final out. With that, Jackson’s team exploded in excitement. High fives were had all around until the coaches got the boys lined up on their respective baselines to go through the ritual of saying, “Good game” to each player on the opposing side. At this level, the coaches still required this sort of compulsory good sportsmanship, but it was clear by comparing the slumped shoulders on the visiting players with the gleeful smiles on the faces of the home team just who had won this game.
As Jackson’s team bled over from the line of players into an excited huddle in front of their dugout, the coach was trying to rein in the excitement so he could impart whatever further instructions he had for his team. Dave noticed his son, Jackson, smack dab in the middle of the celebrating, receiving high five after high five. Then, while Jackson was focused on the coach, his teammates seemed to all simultaneously drift away from him while two other players in uniforms designating them as being Jackson’s teammates came running up, an orange and white Gatorade cooler carried between them. At the last second, whether due to hearing their approach, or from seeing some silent warning on his coach’s face, Jackson started to turn only to be greeted by the chilling rush of ice and purple Gatorade being dumped over his head, drenching him from head to toe and forcing an involuntary shriek out of his lips.
Witnessing this, Dave felt an initial burst of anger at this treatment of his son, which quickly faded into being caught up in the obvious excitement of the team before being replaced with a pride that his son had been singled out for this “reward” as a sign that his teammates clearly felt he was responsible for some significant accomplishment in the game. As the thrill settled, it twisted into self-conscious guilt for being late. He silently cursed that the hearing had gone so long, keeping him from seeing whatever moment of glory his son had delivered.
Seeing the boys jumping around and excited, Dave couldn’t help but feel some of that excitement even as it was tainted with guilt. Then, before he realized it, a sense of frustration with how long this was taking started to creep in. He had things to do tonight. Attempting to get ahead of the dinner issue, Dave dug his cell phone out of his pants pocket and sent a quick text to Emily asking what he should pick up for dinner. Staring at the phone, he waited to see a “read” message pop up to show that Emily had gotten his text. When it did appear, it was quickly followed by a surprise response, “Don’t need to pick up anything.” Dave continued to look at the screen in his hand, waiting for any further clarifying information, but nothing more came. With a sigh, he slid the phone back into his pocket and briefly pondered why he wouldn’t need to pick up dinner. All that he could think of was that Emily had actually cooked tonight. He chuckled. It wasn’t that Emily wasn’t a good cook. In fact, she was quite a good cook, when and if she decided to cook. As a busy nurse, mother of three, and a regular in many different charities both local and globally, not to mention her volunteering at church, there simply wasn’t much time in her schedule for things like cooking dinner. Dave may have worked more than twice as many hours a week as Emily did, but it was Emily who always seemed to be rushed.
Amidst these musings, Dave noticed Jackson walking up to him, still dripping purple from his celebratory drenching. Jackson had his father’s broad shoulders but the darker hair from his mother. The broad expectant smile on his face was right out of his mother’s repertoire and was full of hope. “Did you see my hit,
Dad?” Jackson asked.
Dave may have been late, and he may have missed more time with his kids than he wanted to, but he never lied to them, not even little white lies to spare them. “I’m sorry, buddy. Court went late. I didn’t get here until the last inning, but I’m sure you were great.” As Dave watched his son’s bright expression dim, he added, “But I want to hear all about it.”
With that, they turned toward the parking lot and while walking to the car, Jackson started to describe his bases-loaded triple that won the game for his team. Dave listened and asked questions at the appropriate times, pausing and oohing just right to reinforce his son’s excitement. Reaching the car, Dave popped the trunk and asked Jackson to drop off his bat, glove, and other gear inside while he walked around the passenger side and grabbed his case file, suit jacket, and tie and transferred them to the trunk beside his son’s gear. After closing the trunk, both of them walked to their respective sides and climbed into the car. Dave looked over, staring intently at his son, who knew that Dad was waiting for him to put his seatbelt on. As soon as Jackson’s belt clicked, Dave began backing out. Jackson quickly shot over, “What about your seatbelt, Dad? Mom says you need to wear it too.”
“Your mother isn’t here, and it’s my job to worry about you, not the other way around,” Dave sighed.
With that, they headed home. Dave glanced at the clock, 5:30 p.m. Everything was on schedule or even ahead of schedule. At the same time, Jackson pulled out his cell phone and jumped on social media to see what the buzz was about his game-winning hit and the school’s first trip to the state championship in over thirty years. Father and son loved each other and shared many interests. They both did tae kwon do together and they both enjoyed MMO games, yet they fell into a customary silence on the drive.
Less than fifteen minutes later, Dave was pulling up in front of his house. For the thousandth time, he chuckled wryly as he saw the garage door opener on his windshield. His two-car garage was really more of a wife’s car, lawnmower, kids’ bikes, camping gear, etc. garage. Popping the trunk, both he and Jackson went to get their respective gear out of the trunk without any instruction. Dave loved his son but if there was one thing he really liked about him, it was that even at thirteen he was very diligent and rarely needed to be reminded about chores. Heading up the front walkway, they were greeted by a bundle of curly brown hair and smiles. His youngest daughter, Sara, was always glad to see him and made a smile come to Dave’s face. She called out, “Daddy” before also running to her brother and asking how the game had gone. Dave walked past her with a quick half-hug and let the siblings talk about Jackson’s game. David may have been Sara’s hero, but she followed after her older brother like a little duckling whenever he allowed her to.
Entering the house, Dave saw Emily standing next to the kitchen table and talking to their oldest daughter, Mira. Emily’s head of long black hair was facing away from Dave, involved in some sort of intense conversation with Mira. Even as he quickly glanced around the kitchen, noting the pronounced absence of anything that would pass for dinner, Dave couldn’t help but admire his wife’s figure from behind. Almost seventeen years of marriage and three kids later, and he still loved her curves. Quickly deciding to brave whatever argument Emily and Mira were in the middle of, Dave stepped forward. Despite it being his first instinct to ask about dinner, he had painfully learned that this was not the right way to greet his wife. Instead, he came up behind her with a pat against her butt and a quick kiss on her cheek.
“You look beautiful today, sweetie,” Dave said.
Emily may still have been a beautiful woman in the eyes of her husband, but she felt every extra ounce that came with her thirty-nine years and struggled to accept any compliment, even one as bland as what Dave had just offered. Turning toward her husband, Emily snapped, “Please tell your daughter that she has to come with us tonight.”
Caught off guard by the momentary distraction of her emerald green eyes, Dave floundered. “What do you mean, go where?”
“Arghh.” Dave could almost hear the growl as his wife’s ire quickly shifted targets from Mira to him. “Don’t tell me you forgot about tonight too?”
Taking his dumbfounded look as confirmation of his guilt, Emily fully turned toward Dave, hands on her hips in that “now you’re gonna get it” pose so familiar to both husband and children. “You never listen to me. I might as well be speaking to myself half the time.” Then she trailed off into her native Spanish, knowing full well that Dave had no idea what she was saying but was too exasperated to care.
“Tonight, we are picking Nana Gonzalez up for dinner from the nursing home. Does that ring a bell?”
Dave vaguely remembered her mentioning something about this, but somehow he had not connected his Friday night gaming time and this event together. Nana Gonzalez was his wife’s last living grandparent and a very sweet ninety-four-year-old, but taking her to dinner was not on his agenda for tonight. “Well, actually, honey…” he began but the sentence was never completed.
It always amazed him after having survived Marine Corps boot camp, a tour in Iraq, and law school that this little five-foot-two fireball he called his wife could intimidate him so much.
“No ‘well honey’s’ tonight. I have had this on the calendar for over a month and you know how Nana looks forward to our visits. What could you possibly have to do tonight that would be more important than family?” She dropped the f-bomb of guilt as if to dare him to respond.
A wiser man would have just ducked his head for cover and gone with the flow, but while Dave might have had a high IQ, he had a stunted emotional quotient and didn’t know when to just cut his losses. “It’s just that tonight the guild…”
“This is about that stupid game?”
“Well, we’ve been working for weeks to get ready…”
“Working, that’s what I do at the hospital, that’s what I do when I’m washing your clothes, cleaning your house, and taking care of your children. Working is what I do on Saturday at the soup kitchen and when we raise supplies for the orphanage in Guatemala. Heck, working is even what you do when you go to the office. That game is most definitely not working. I swear sometimes that I’m married to a five-year-old.” Emily fumed, venting out her frustration so quickly that Dave couldn’t get a word in edgewise.
Head spinning, before he knew it, Dave was driving down a country road going the back way toward the nursing home twenty-five minutes away with a car full of mostly upset people. His mood soured as he rigorously stared at the road, hands gripping the steering wheel at ten and two with far more force than necessary. Mira was studiously ignoring family while listening to music pumped through her earbuds. Emily was alternating between checking Facebook and staring icy daggers at him. The only people in the car who were happy were Jackson and Sara. Jackson didn’t really care where they were going. He was happily involved in half a dozen Snapchat conversations about his team’s victory, and at eight, Sara was oblivious to the family tensions and just happy to be going to see Nana.
Stuck in their individual worlds, the Nelson family was utterly unaware of the pair of eyes watching their car from both impossibly far away and incredibly close at hand.
“Yes, they are perfect. Do them next,” spoke a dark gravelly voice which could not be heard by the family.
“But they have children with them,'' countered a voice that practically sang with all of the varied tones of a cathedral organ.
“All the better.”
“If we are sending a family, then they will need extra instruction and preparation.”
“I already agreed that you could provide whatever instruction and preparation that you deemed necessary.”
Sighing in resignation, the second voice said, “Very well. Here is the aura needed.”
Even as the conversation took place, Dave and Emily both simultaneously reached the conclusion that they needed to clear the air before getting to the nursing home. They just had completely different ideas abou
t how to go about that.
“I’m sorry I forgot about tonight, Emily...” began Dave.
In the same instant, Emily blurted out, “Why do you never listen to me? Is that damn game so important? Is it more important than your family?”
Those quickly spoken words, intended to get to the heart of the matter, turned Dave’s guilty feeling into a feeling of anger and brought out the lawyer in him, ready to argue at a moment’s notice. “I have never said it was more important than family. And you could be glad that your husband’s vice is playing an MMO. Half the lawyers I know are out drinking most nights or cheating on their wives. All I do is play a game.”
Staring at each other in mutual frustration and mutual assurance of the reasonableness of their respective positions, neither Dave nor Emily had their eyes on the road. Maybe it would have made a difference if their eyes had been forward or maybe it wouldn’t have mattered at all. Their first warning that something was wrong was the scream that Sara let out. Loud enough to draw every set of eyes in the car first to her and then, a split second later, out the front windshield of the car. Her scream came bursting forth as she saw a silver oval of light the size of a barn door spring into existence mere feet in front of their moving car. As Dave looked forward and saw the gleaming portal, he had no chance to react. In an instant, the Nelsons’ car plunged headlong into the event horizon of the portal, being disintegrated at a subatomic level, car and passengers alike.
