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Ryan ten, Corinne had gotten pregnant. It had been a surprise. Adam had some issues with a low sperm count as he got older, so their birth control had been closest to the silent-prayer method. This was, of course, irresponsible on their part. At the time, he and Corinne had never discussed the factthat they wouldn’t have more children. It just seemed—up to that point anyway—to be an unspoken agreement between them.
    Adam caught his reflection in the mirror. The voice in the back of his head was starting up again. He quietly padded back down the hall. He brought up the web browser and searched for
DNA test
. The first one was sold at Walgreens. He was about to hit the order button and then thought better of it. Someone might open the box. He’d pick it up tomorrow.
    Adam headed back to his room and sat on the bed. Corinne’s scent, still a powerful pheromone after all these years, lingered, or maybe that was just his imagination working overtime.
    The stranger’s voice came back to him.
    “You didn’t have to stay with her.”
    Adam laid his head on the pillow, blinked up at the ceiling, and just let the gentle sounds of his still home overwhelm him.

Chapter 5
    A dam woke up at 7:00 A.M . Ryan was waiting by the bedroom door. “Dad . . . ?”
    “Yeah.”
    “Can you check the e-mail and see if Coach Baime sent out the results yet?”
    “Already done. You made the A team.”
    Ryan didn’t outwardly celebrate. That wasn’t his way. He nodded and tried to hold back his smile. “Can I go to Max’s after school?”
    “What are you guys going to do on such a beautiful day?”
    “Sit in the dark and play video games,” Ryan said.
    Adam frowned, but he knew that Ryan was pulling his leg.
    “Jack and Colin are coming over too. We’re going to play lacrosse.”
    “Sure.” Adam swung his legs out of the bed. “Did you eat breakfast?”
    “Not yet.”
    “You want me to make you Daddy eggs?”
    “Only if you promise not to call them Daddy eggs.”
    Adam smiled. “Deal.”
    For a moment, Adam forgot about the night before and the stranger and Novelty Funsy and Fake-A-Pregnancy.com. It had, as such things do, taken on a dreamlike quality, where you nearly question whether you had imagined the whole thing. He knew better, of course. He was blocking. He had, in fact, managed to sleep pretty well last night. If there had been dreams, Adam didn’t remember them now. Adam slept well most nights. Corinne was the one who stayed up and worried. Somewhere along the way, Adam had learned to not worry about what he couldn’t control, to let go. This had been a healthy thing, this ability to compartmentalize. Now he wondered whether it was an ability to let go or simply to block.
    He headed downstairs and made breakfast. “Daddy eggs” were scrambled up with milk, mustard, and Parmesan cheese. When Ryan was six, he loved Daddy eggs, but like most things with little kids, he outgrew them, labeling them “lame” one day and vowing never to touch them again. Recently, his new coach had told Ryan that he should always start the day with a high-protein breakfast, and so Daddy eggs had been revived like a nostalgic musical.
    As Adam watched his son attack the plate as though it had offended him, he again tried to picture the six-year-old Ryan eating this same dish in this same room. The image wouldn’t come to him.
    Thomas had a ride, so Ryan and Adam drove to school incomfortable silence, father and son. They passed a Baby Gap and a Tiger Schulmann’s karate school. A Subway had opened up in that “dead” spot on the corner, that one storefront in every town where nothing seems to work. It’d already housed a bagel shop, a jewelry store, an upscale mattress chain, and a Blimpie, which Adam had always thought was the same thing as Subway anyway.
    “’Bye, Dad. Thanks.”
    Ryan hopped out of the car without a cheek kiss. When did Ryan stop kissing him? He couldn’t remember.
    He circled across Oak Street, headed