The Fist Remembered

He walked down the dim hall to his study. The house was cold from the central air, smelling faintly of lemon wax and stale flowers from the terrace party. He didn’t turn on the overhead lights. He clicked on the green banker’s lamp on his desk and sat in the leather armchair.

On the blotter sat the incident summary Oliver had printed an hour after the ambulance left: Gross staff inattention resulting in accidental immersion.

Graham didn’t open the folder. He rested his right elbow on the mahogany desk and raised his hand into the circle of light.

His palm was broad, the skin across the knuckles pale and dry. He stared at the flat lines of his fingers. He remembered the sound it had made when it struck Clara Bennett’s wet cheek—a crack like green timber snapping in a winter freeze. It had stopped the party music dead.

He curled his fingers into a tight fist, held it until his joints ached, then let it fall open again.

Upstairs, the floorboards groaned softly, followed by a thin whimper. Graham stood and took the stairs two at a time back to the nursery.

Lily was thrashing beneath her quilt. Her eyes were squeezed shut against a bad dream, but her hands were up in the dim amber glow of the nightlight, both palms shoving forward into the empty dark.