The Birthday Room by Kevin Henkes Page B

parent.”
    Ben nodded.
    They passed a sign that read OCEAN BEACHES . The sign had an arrow indicating a turn to the left, but no indication as to how many miles separated them from the sea. Ben guessed one hundred.
    â€œThe, uh, the reason,” Ian said stiffly, “ one of the reasons I invited you for this visit was so that I could see you before we have the baby.” He swallowed, and his Adam’s apple bobbed. It looked as if a large grape were lodged inside his throat. “I needed to know that you were okay, that I hadn’t ruined your life.”
    â€œYou didn’t,” Ben said, surprised. He rolled his window up and down, changing the air inside the car. “Really.”
    Ian was wearing sunglasses. For the most part, he kept his head fixed straight ahead, his eyes pinned to the road. “I’m sorry,” he said, his eyes darting to the side.
    â€œIt’s okay,” said Ben. “No problem.” He continued to play with the window. “You know, I heard that we don’t really need our pinkies anyway. And that maybe in a couple hundred years or so, people won’t even be born with them. We’ll lose them, evolutionarily. An anthropologist said so on National Public Radio, so it must be true.”
    Ian chuckled.
    â€œI don’t just sit around and listen to NPR,” Ben explained. “Mom and Dad have it on in the bookstore. That’s where I heard it.”
    Ian sighed an enormous sigh, then smiled. He was gripping the steering wheel with one hand and tapping it with the other. “You are one of the most okay people I’ve ever known.” He sighed again. Dark trees sped by. “After the accident,” he said, “I vowed I’d never have kids of my own. I was afraid of them, couldn’t even hold one. So when I found out that Nina was going to have a baby, I panicked. In April, I took off for a couple of weeks to be alone, to think. I was so . . . I don’t know—worried, I guess. Worried about what kind of parent I’d be, because of what I’d done to you.”
    It was almost as if Ian were talking to himself.
    â€œI camped up in the mountains,” Ian continued, “seeing how little I could get by on. Bread, cheese, water, fruit. And one very cold, starry night, I decided I wanted to see you. I decided that that was what it would take. . . .”
    Ben didn’t know how to respond. It felt odd to be confided in.
    Ian said, “Seeing you has allowed me to begin again.”
    Ben pushed his knees against the glove compartment and sank into his seat. He coughed once. After a minute or two, he said, “So Aunt Nina knows all about my hand?”
    â€œOf course.”
    â€œDoes Mom know what you just told me?”
    â€œNo. I suppose she thinks this trip—Actually, I don’t know what she thinks.”
    â€œAre you going to tell her?”
    Ian shook his head. “Not necessary. Unless you want to. And it’s fine with me if you do.”
    â€œNah.” It would be their secret. Ben turned to his uncle and started to ask something. “Will you—” but couldn’t finish.
    â€œYou can ask me.”
    â€œWill you tell me about the accident?”
    Something out the window, something unseen to Ben, seemed to catch Ian’s attention. “I suspect you’ve heard it all before,” he said. “I still don’t really know how it happened. It happened so fast. I was baby-sitting you at my house, and I had given you a little chair I had built and you were very excited about it, as I remember. But the legs were too long. And uneven. I told you I’d fix the chair as soon as your mom came to pick you up. She was late and you wanted your chair and so I took you down to my basement workshop. . . . I was a stupid, stupid—” He stopped himself. With the heels of his hands guiding the steering wheel, he raised his fingers in a