Then Mara had changed hers.
Then they had both found excuses.
Noah was seven.
Noah worried when the washing machine made a new noise.
Noah once cried for two days after learning that their neighbor’s cat had died.
How were they supposed to explain cancer?
Caleb looked into his son’s eyes.
“It’s a department at the hospital.”
“What kind?”
Caleb did not answer quickly enough.
Noah knew.
Children often knew before adults gave them credit.
His lower lip trembled.
“Is it cancer?”
Caleb’s breath stopped.
Noah whispered, “I looked it up.”
“On what?”
“My tablet.”
Caleb almost laughed.
Not because anything was funny.
Because he and Mara had spent thirty minutes arguing about internet restrictions while their son apparently knew how to research medical departments.
Noah’s voice cracked.
“Do you have cancer?”
Caleb sat down on the concrete floor.
He did not care that his jeans were dirty.
He did not care that the Harley stood beside him carrying somebody else’s dried blood.
He held one hand toward Noah.
The boy hesitated.
Then stepped forward.
Caleb pulled him close.
Noah stayed stiff for the first second.
Then collapsed against his chest.
Caleb wrapped both arms around him.
“It’s called lymphoma.”
Noah’s breathing changed.
Fast.
Shallow.
Caleb rubbed his back.
“The doctors found it early.”
“Are you going to die?”
There it was again.
The same question.
Only now Caleb understood that Noah had not been asking about motorcycles.
He had been asking about the envelope.
Caleb closed his eyes.
“I’m planning very hard not to.”
Noah pulled away.
“That’s not an answer.”
Caleb stared at him.
The sentence sounded exactly like Mara.
Even the expression.
Caleb smiled weakly.
“You sound like your mother.”
“I asked you.”
“I know.”
“Are you?”
Caleb wanted to say no.
Wanted to give the simple answer children deserved.
No.
Dad is fine.
Dad is strong.
Nothing bad happens here.
He could not.
Because if the next months taught Noah anything, Caleb did not want the lesson to be that love required pretending.
So he said, “I don’t know.”
Noah stared.
Caleb continued before fear could fill the silence.
“But the doctors think the treatment can work.”
“How much?”
“What?”
“How much do they think?”
Caleb understood.
Numbers.
Probabilities.
Noah had inherited that from him.
Asking for measurements when emotion became too large.
Caleb rubbed one hand over his beard.
“Good chance.”
“That means what?”
“A very good chance.”
Noah frowned.
“You’re changing the words.”
Caleb sighed.
“The doctor said the type I have responds well to treatment.”
“Does that mean you’ll be okay?”
“It means we have a lot of reason to believe I can be.”
Noah looked at the bandage above Caleb’s eyebrow.
Then at the Harley.
Then at the dried blood.
“Is that why you crashed?”
“I didn't crash.”
“Mom said you had an accident.”
Caleb looked toward the house again.
Mara had used the gentlest available word.
Accident.
Not fight.
Not roadside attack.
Not man collapsing beside a gas station after somebody swung a tire iron.
Caleb had not told Noah the full story.
He had barely told Mara.
Noah pointed at the motorcycle.
“If you didn't crash, whose blood is that?”
Caleb looked at the tank.
The question had been waiting.
He had hoped cleaning the bike before Noah saw it would prevent exactly this.
Too late.
“The man I helped.”
“What man?”
Caleb leaned back against the Harley’s rear tire.