On Sunday, Lee left early to get to his mother's house for Kylie's birthday dinner. He took the Holland Tunnel as usual, heading west on Route 78, but when he reached the turnoff to Route 202 he took local roads the rest of the way, winding through the towns of Morris, Sussex, and Hunterdon Counties. He watched pastures give way to villages, winding through narrow main streets before emerging back out and past the sweet-smelling farm fields of the central portion of the state.
Most people thought of Jersey as an ugly jumble of industrial wasteland wrapped around Newark and Jersey City. That's what you saw when you came in from the south: miles of polluted swamplands crisscrossed by major highways and crammed with factories and spewing smokestacks. Visitors to New York flying into Newark Airport would go rattling and jouncing along poorly kept roads with signs that looked as if they'd been there since the 1930s-and that would remain their only impression of the much-maligned neighboring state.
But the vast majority of New Jersey was fertile farm fields, orchards, and pastures. Driving through the soft late-summer countryside, it was hard to imagine that there was anything harsh or wicked in the world.
But of course, Lee knew better He was nine and Laura just six when their secure and cozy existence was shattered, like a plastic Christmas village picked up by an unseen hand and shaken, the familiar scene obscured by the snowflakes falling all around. There had been increasing tension between their parents for some time. They had few arguments, but there was a growing distance between them that both children noticed. Long silences at the dinner table were becoming more common, their mother serving the meal, then wordlessly slipping into her chair without even saying grace, something that had been unthinkable in the past. She had always insisted in maintaining certain social rituals, regardless of belief. But lately she had become a grim creature, going about her daily tasks with a dour determination that was unlike her, her high spirits dampened by some unseen sorrow. It seemed to Lee that she was laughing less and less, and he often saw her staring out the window after his father's car as he drove off to work in the morning.
His father, too, had changed: gone were the evenings when he would come up behind her in the kitchen and tickle her neck. She would turn just as he slipped his arm around her waist, hugging her to him, tucking his head into the nape of her neck. Neither of them was given to public display of affection, so this was a ritual the children especially enjoyed. But now they seemed to be moving around the house like strangers, talking only when necessary, acknowledging each other's presence with no affection or intimacy. There were no fights, but there was such a coldness between them that the air itself seemed to shiver. Lee longed to ask about it, but important matters such as that were rarely spoken about in their family.
It was a Friday evening in September, and their father had come home late, missing dinner that night, whiskey on his breath, his mood unusually volatile. The children were upstairs getting ready for bed, and they heard his footsteps on the stairs, slower and heavier than usual. They were both in Lee's room. Laura was sitting cross-legged on the floor reading a book of Grimm's fairy tales, and Lee was mending a piece of track on his model train. Their father came into the room and greeted the children with unusually affectionate hugs for such a normally reserved man, squeezing both of them until they pulled away, puzzled at his odd behavior.
Lee remembered his words on that night, because they were some of the last words he ever heard his father say.
"I love you both very much-you know that, don't you?" he said, holding each of them by the shoulder. Lee remembered the feel of that strong hand pressing down on him, a kind of desperation in the touch. He could smell the musty aroma of malt whiskey on his father's breath, and looked at his sister, who seemed as perplexed as he was. She was wearing her pink pajamas with the fluffy white bunny tail, and next to her was her beloved Pooh bear with the missing orange glass eye, whom she always slept with. Both of the children were taken aback by this emotional declaration of affection in a man who believed in spareness in all things-except perhaps single-malt Scotch.
Duncan Campbell stood gazing at them, and Lee was startled to see his eyes brimming with tears. "Whatever may come," he said huskily in a voice throaty from emotion and whiskey, "always remember that I love you." The children were too surprised to say anything. They sensed from their father's mood something important and solemn was about to happen, but they had no idea what it was.
Their father opened his mouth as if he was going to say something more, then, changing his mind, turned and left the room. Laura started to cry softly. As always, feeling that it was his job as the older brother to comfort and take care of her, Lee patted her head as though she were a puppy and said, "Don't cry-it's all right." But even as he said the words, he did not believe them. He knew that something was very wrong.
The sound of conversation rose from downstairs, and he and Laura crept out to the landing overlooking the living room, peering down through the wooden slats to listen to the unfolding drama. Their parents were in the kitchen, but the door was open, and their voices carried through the house to where the children sat listening intently.
"Don't lay all of this on my doorstep," their father was saying, his voice tight and angry, the words a little slurred at the edges.
"That's exactly where I'm laying it!" their mother replied, shrill and almost hysterical. Lee's stomach twisted as he listened-this was so unlike his mother, normally so calm and in control of her emotions. Laura grasped his hand in hers, crying harder now, the tears spilling onto the front of her pink pajamas. Lee squeezed her hand and put his other arm around her shoulders.
"None of this would ever have happened," his father said, "if it weren't for-"
"Don't you dare bring that up!" his mother cried savagely. "I swear, Duncan Campbell, if you ever dare mention that again-"
Now it was his father who interrupted. "Fine, I won't. But you know as well as I do if we'd only been able to talk about it, none of this would have-"
"Doesn't that sound all tidy and virtuous?" his mother sneered. "All we have to do is talk about it, is that it, and everything will be all right?"
There was a pause, and his father said slowly, "You blame me. You have always blamed me, and you will always blame me. There's nothing I can do with that, Fiona, and I have tried these past three years-God knows I've tried. I thought I could earn your forgiveness, but I see now I was wrong."
"Forgiveness!" his mother hissed. "After what you've done, you can talk about forgiveness?"
There was a long pause, and then the sound of footsteps coming out of the kitchen and toward the living room. The children ducked back from the stairwell landing, but their father crossed to the front door without a glance in their direction. He was wearing his coat and hat and carrying a suitcase. Their mother came running after him, crying hysterically.
"Fine, then!" she shouted, her voice choking and wavering with emotion. "Go-just go, will you? We don't need you around here-we're better off without you! Just go, damn you!"
Their father turned around, his hand on the doorknob, and looked at her sadly. "Good-bye, Fiona," he said, and left the house, closing the door behind him.
It was the last time the children ever saw their father. Fiona collapsed onto the living room couch, weeping uncontrollably. It was a horrible sound-strange, strangled sobs, like the agony of a wild animal. Caught between the need to care for his sister and comfort his mother, Lee crept downstairs and cradled his mother in his arms.