She thought of Flip’s off-the-cuff comment about how boring her life would be if she married Henry. Just thinking about it made her heart race. Would she be bored with someone like Henry? She didn’t think Flip gave him enough credit. There was much more to Henry than Flip realized. And it wasn’t just his personal life that made him interesting, though that certainly qualified as complex. Eliza thought if she was willing to peel back the layers, she’d find many things about Henry to admire.
For one, he was fun to kiss. Clearly, he was struggling to move past his divorce and find his footing as a part-time dad. Either that or she completely repulsed him, and the baggage of his life was an easy way to let her down gently and make sure she knew she better not try to kiss him again—ever.
But he didn’t push me away.
It hadn’t been a fly-to-the-moon, pop-your-foot-up kind of kiss, but she’d felt something. And all her feminine intuition told her he had felt something too. Eliza groaned, grabbed a throw pillow, and pressed it firmly into her face. Her brain was too tired for this. She reached for the remote control. Maybe thoughtless television would provide the distraction she needed. But it was no use. No matter how hard she tried to turn off her brain, she couldn’t get Henry off her mind.
She thought again of what he’d told her regarding his biological father. If she put on her counselor hat, it was easy to recognize the ways Henry’s early childhood experiences could have influenced his ability to open up to people or how they had hindered his ease at developing close relationships. Eliza understood firsthand the emotional scarring that occurred when children felt abandoned or forgotten by one or both of their parents. It had taken her mother a long time to earn back Eliza’s trust. Their relationship was in a good place now, but it hadn’t happened overnight.
Henry had seemed certain he wanted nothing to do with his biological father, but Eliza couldn’t help but wonder if the feeling was mutual. Had William Harrison simply signed off, removing himself completely from Henry’s life, or was it possible that he still thought of the son he’d once had? There was no way for Eliza to know the man’s thoughts or feelings, but maybe there was a way for her to know something about him. At the very least, she could probably find out if he was still in prison.
She reached for her laptop once more and navigated her browser to the North Carolina Inmate Enquiry page of the Department of Corrections. She filled out the search fields, and her search yielded seventeen results. She clicked through each listing, looking for dates that corresponded with a visit from a five-year-old Henry. When she found him, it wasn’t the dates that gave him away. Eliza gasped when the picture pulled up. She was staring into the face of an older, sadder version of Henry—William Grant Harrison.
Her heart started racing as she read the details of his history. His crimes weren’t insignificant, though she was at least comforted to know the charges against him were not as serious as they could have been. She would have hated to learn Henry’s father was guilty of assault or even murder. He’d served time for grand theft and possession of a firearm, as well as drug possession and distribution.
Because of North Carolina’s “three strike” policy, his third conviction had landed him in prison with a life sentence. But there, at the very bottom of his profile, were the words Released on parole for good behavior. It was dated nearly two years prior. Next to his release date was an address, presumably the address he would go home to upon release. It was in a town called Lawsonville, a suburb, Google told her, of Winston-Salem. If Eliza remembered correctly, Henry’s mother had lived in Winston-Salem before she’d remarried and moved to Rose Creek.
As Eliza read through the details of the page one more time, she began to feel uncomfortable. Who was she to intrude on Henry’s privacy? He hadn’t asked her to search for his father. It was only impulsivity that had led her to do so. Now that she’d actually found something, she wasn’t sure how she should process the information. Should she tell Henry? It didn’t feel right to keep it a secret.
She pulled up Gmail, hoping that if Henry was online, she could send him an instant message. She was relieved to see him under her list of available contacts. She clicked on his name to send him a message.
Eliza: Please don’t hate me . . .
Henry: I could never hate you. Why?
Eliza: I just Googled your biological father.
Eliza held her breath, waiting for his response. When, after a moment, he didn’t respond, she sent him another message.
Eliza: I’m sorry, Henry. I was only curious. I probably shouldn’t have, but once I found something, I felt like it would be wrong for me not to tell you.
Henry: It’s okay. I’ve searched for him before too. Is he still in prison?
Eliza: He was released on parole two years ago.
. . .
. . .
. . .
Eliza: Henry?
Henry: Yes?
Eliza: Are you all right?
Henry: Yes. Good night, Eliza.
Eliza: Good night.
* * *
Eliza caught up with Henry in the parking lot after church the following day.
“Henry,” she said as she approached him. “You got a minute?”
He turned. “Sure.”
She tried to read his expression. She had been worrying all morning about how he really felt about her digging into his past.
“Listen, about last night . . .” She watched Henry stiffen. He placed his scriptures on the roof of his car and slid his hands into his pockets. “I just wanted to apologize in person. I don’t know why I felt like it was my place to meddle in your private affairs. I hope I didn’t make you uncomfortable.”
“It’s really fine.” She was relieved to hear the sincerity in his voice. “You didn’t do any harm by running a search for his name. Why were you so curious though? Why does it even matter?”
“I don’t know,” Eliza answered. “I guess it just made me sad thinking about the possibility of this man existing out there somewhere without a single clue about who you are, how amazing you are. I remember feeling awful, completely worthless when my mother let social services walk me out of her house. She didn’t even try to stop them, and I was heartbroken. But it wasn’t that she didn’t care. I know your father gave you up, but he must have loved you at some point—enough that he would get a tattoo of your name—”
“Tattoo?” Henry looked surprised.
“It was listed as a part of his physical description.”
Henry shook his head. “I must have missed that part.”
“I saw his picture, Henry. He . . .” She hesitated. “He looks just like you.”
Henry took a deep breath. “I don’t really know what to say. I mean, what do I do with information like that? Call him up? Invite him to dinner?” He sighed. “He’s not my family.”
“You’re right,” Eliza said. “He isn’t your family. But what if there is some small chance that he cares? Maybe he’s thought about you, wondered how you turned out. He spent your whole life in prison. Maybe he would appreciate knowing that not everything he contributed to this world was bad. Maybe it would feel good for him to know you’re happy, successful.”
Henry stifled a laugh. “Or maybe he was happy to be rid of a living, breathing burden of responsibility. Don’t you see? It could go either way. Sure, looking this guy up might prove to be a cathartic experience of some sort, but it could also open old scars and hurts, even create new ones on top of the old. And I don’t have just me to think about. How would it affect AJ? Is this the kind of man I would want my son to know? I mean, let’s be real. It’s not as if a life full of convictions and prison sentences gives him much of a positive track record.”
Henry made a very valid point. He did have to think about AJ, and that was reason enough to be extremely cautious. “You’re right. I hadn’t thought of it that way, but you’re completely right. I don’t know what I was thinking.”
“You’re thinking like Eliza—who bel
ieves that hearts are good and intentions always kind. I like that about you, but this time, I can’t do it. I’m just not willing to see the best in William Harrison.”
Chapter 13
Henry sat alone in his classroom on Monday afternoon and stared at his laptop, William Harrison’s photo filling the screen. He’d been sitting there far too long; his last class had ended well over an hour ago. But he couldn’t get up. He felt frozen—the tired eyes of William Harrison locking him into place behind his computer screen.
He didn’t blame Eliza for looking him up. Her intentions were pure, if not a little meddlesome. And it wasn’t as if she’d found out information he didn’t already know. He’d been eighteen the first time he’d used the Internet to try to find his father. Though his mother had offered to talk about him a time or two, it was never a conversation Henry wanted to have with her. It felt wrong somehow to make her relive past hurts just to satisfy his need to have more answers. But the Internet felt safe, just detached enough for him to gain information without the risk of anyone getting hurt.
And he hadn’t gotten hurt. He’d learned the man was still in prison, confirming Henry’s opinion that he really was better off without him. And Henry hadn’t looked for him since, not until Eliza had mentioned that she’d found him.
The mug shot with his file was newer than the one Henry had seen previously. His hair was gray, and the lines surrounding his eyes and mouth were more pronounced. Eliza said she thought Henry looked like him, but Henry wasn’t so sure. The eyes were the same; he could at least see that much.
It was particularly unsettling because they weren’t just Henry’s eyes—they were AJ’s eyes too.
Henry shook his head in frustration. He didn’t want to think about this man. He didn’t want to think about William Harrison’s blood coursing through AJ’s veins, making his eyes that distinct shade of blue that people always noticed. He didn’t want to think about a tattoo of his name etched onto the chest of the man who wasn’t supposed to love him, who wasn’t supposed to have ever cared. Eliza’s questions from the previous afternoon played over and over in his head.
What if he did care? What if he would like to know that Henry had turned out okay?
Henry scrolled to the bottom of the screen and saw the home address, a route number in Lawsonville. With just a few simple clicks, he entered the address into a search engine and was able to find a telephone number.
The name registered to the number was Paul Harrison. A brother, maybe?
Oh, what the heck, Henry thought to himself. Impulsively, he reached for his office phone and quickly dialed the number. His heart raced, sweat dripping down his brow as he listened to one ring, then two. On the third ring, a man answered the phone.
“Hello?” The voice was older and gruff.
Henry was silent, paralyzed by fear.
“Hello?” the voice said again.
This was madness. Henry didn’t want to have a phone conversation with William Harrison. He didn’t want to know what his voice sounded like or know if he’d had a nice day. He didn’t want to know the man at all. What had he been thinking?
He hung up the phone and shoved it forcefully across his desk, sending a cup of pencils careening onto the floor.
Henry leaned his head into his hands and tried to slow his breathing. Even on the off chance that Eliza was right, a conversation with William Harrison simply wasn’t something he was ready for—not now, maybe not ever.
* * *
Wednesday, a week later, Henry sat at the same desk in his classroom, waiting for his two o’clock appointment with Daniel. He was nervous and anxious to discover if he’d read his book. The thought of someone else turning the pages of his manuscript and reading the words he had so carefully crafted nearly made him sick. What if Daniel hadn’t liked it? What if he’d read four chapters in and decided it wasn’t even worth his time?
Henry stood and shoved his hands into his pockets, breathing out an agitated sigh. His head was in the wrong place. He knew his focus shouldn’t be on his book. He should be thinking about Daniel, about what he was trying to accomplish with him. He hoped his effort to reach out would work—that his leap of faith would pay off in the form of a stronger relationship. Of course, it wouldn’t hurt if, in the process, he was able to hear Daniel’s opinion of One Day in Ten.
At the sound of footsteps approaching, Henry picked up a stack of papers from his desk and tried to look busy. Daniel shuffled into the room and, per his usual routine, dropped his backpack on the floor and slumped into the middle desk of the front row, just across from Henry’s desk. Henry looked up, waiting for Daniel to speak. When he didn’t, he moved around his desk and leaned against it, sitting lightly on the edge.
“How was your stay in the wilderness?”
Daniel gave a halfhearted shrug. “The food stunk.”
Henry laughed. “I’ve heard Flip’s not much of a cook.” More silence passed before Henry said, “Right, well, I guess we should get started.”
“It was good.” Daniel interrupted him. “Your book—it was good.”
Henry breathed a quiet sigh of relief. “Thank you.”
“Are you going to publish it?”
“Maybe someday.”
“Why not now?” Daniel asked. “People should read it.”
Henry folded his arms across his chest. “Daniel, can I tell you something man to man?”
Daniel looked skeptical. “I guess.”
“Besides me, you’re the only person in the world who’s read that book.”
“Dude, you’re kidding, right?”
“I’m not kidding. I’ve never shown it to anyone.”
“Why not?”
“The honest, naked truth,” Henry said, “is that I’m too much of a chicken. It’s hard to let others read your words. It feels like it’s me on those pages, you know? It’s personal.”
“So why’d you let me read it, then?”
Henry moved to the desk beside Daniel’s and sat down, leaning back and extending his legs out in front of him. “I was hoping since I showed you a little bit of what I like to write, you’d tell me a little bit about what you like to write.”
Daniel was silent for a moment. “What makes you think I like to write?”
“Call it a hunch.”
Daniel didn’t respond.
“Listen,” Henry said. “We’re going to skip all this extra stuff, and I’m going to move you into a curriculum I think will work well for you. If you decide you don’t like it, we’ll figure out something else. You’ll be doing a lot of reading, but I’d like to give you the opportunity to write as well. I’m not putting you in with another English class. It’ll just be you and me, one-on-one. If you’re up to it, I thought we might work together, maybe form our own critique group, so to speak. What do you think?”
Daniel looked at him out of the corner of his eye. “So, what, like you read my stuff, and I read yours?”
“Among other things, yes.”
Daniel was quiet. He rolled his pencil up and down his desk for what seemed like an eternity to Henry. “Science fiction,” he finally said. “That’s what I like to write—science fiction, maybe a little fantasy.”
Henry felt the tension in his shoulders ease. This was what he had been waiting for—for Daniel to let him in.
Daniel reached into his bag and pulled out Henry’s manuscript. “Here. You probably want this back. And also . . .” He placed a stack of loose-leaf paper filled with the tiny scrawl of his handwriting on top of Henry’s heftier work. “It’s just four chapters, but . . . I don’t know. You can read it if you want.”
“I’d really like that,” Henry said. “How about we break for today, and I’ll see if I can’t have this read before our next class. If you’d like to move forward, I’ll have an outline of your new curriculum and your reading assignments ready for you Friday afternoon. Sound good?”
“Sounds good,” Daniel echoed. He stood and headed toward the door, turning be
fore he walked out. “Thanks, Mr. Jacobson. See you Friday.”
As he watched Daniel walk away, Henry said a silent prayer of gratitude for the progress he had just made. But God wasn’t the only person he needed to thank. Henry knew he needed to find Eliza.
* * *
Henry had one more class after his session with Daniel. After his students left, he hurried through the last of his paperwork, anxious to find Eliza to tell her about his progress with Daniel.
On his way out of his classroom, he ran into Natalie. “Hey, have you seen Eliza?” he asked.
“She had group counseling until four. You might check her office. She normally heads there to write her reports after her sessions.”
“Thanks, Natalie. If you see her, can you tell her I’m looking for her?”
Eliza wasn’t in her office, but Henry found her on the front porch of the old building, sitting on one of the long cedar benches with Flip. They were leaning forward, obviously deep in conversation. For a moment, Henry waffled back and forth between feeling like he shouldn’t interrupt because they seemed so lost in conversation and feeling like he had to interrupt . . . because they were so lost in conversation. In the end, good manners won, and he turned to walk away, but then Eliza must have glanced up and seen him.
“Henry,” she called.
“Sorry,” Henry said. “I didn’t want to interrupt.”
Eliza shook her head. “It’s fine. What’s up?”
Henry felt awkward and self-conscious talking to Eliza with Flip close by and watching. Flip was good with people, good at communicating—a skill Henry knew he often lacked. As a contrast to Eliza’s conversation with Flip, she was sure to find Henry foolish and clumsy. “It’s nothing. We can just talk another time.”
Eliza got up and walked over to where he stood. “Are you all right?”
“Oh, I’m fine,” Henry said. “I just . . . I had a good class session with Daniel today. I just wanted to thank you for your advice.”
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