The Kraken Project

51

It was almost midnight. Dan Gould was sitting in his chair in the living room, reading the San Francisco Chronicle online, but he couldn’t concentrate. He was sick of the negativity leading up to the election and the scandal over the president’s heart condition. He wished the president would just release his medical records and shut everyone up.

He turned off the iPad and put it aside. The flush of excitement from thinking about his robot project had given way to more anxiety about his son. Once Jacob had been his buddy, spending hours with him in the shop, helping him with his projects. But around the time Jacob turned twelve, he had stopped confiding in him and sharing his hopes and fears. He closed up more when Sully moved away. And then there was the accident, and then his son going down to the beach and … He couldn’t bear to think about it. It still didn’t seem possible that his sweet boy, his little son, could have made such a terribly adult and irrevocable decision. But of course Jacob had had no idea what he was doing; he’d been confused, depressed.

There was a flash of lightning, a distant rumble of thunder. Dan could hear the rain pattering against the windows. It was a gloomy night, and it dampened his spirits further.

He heard the rustle as his wife, Pamela, turned a page of the paper.

Dan said, “Maybe I should buzz up there and check on him again.”

“He’s fine. He called fifty minutes ago, and he’ll call again in ten. Leave him alone. You yourself said he’d never looked so happy.”

“He should be going to bed.”

“We can tell him that when he calls.”

Dan picked up his iPad, turned it back on, tried to read, put it down again. Pamela folded up and laid down her paper and picked up her recently arrived book club thriller, a novel called The Third Gate.

Dan’s thoughts drifted to the robot project once again. He was deeply gratified that his son had chosen to take Charlie with him as a companion. He listened to the rain lashing the windows, the distant rumble of thunder. Next week was the big moment in his project, the culmination of a lot of discussions, presentations, and layers of reviews by the venture capital investors. If he could land a promise of financing, all would be well. And if not, he could still sell the land. His mind drifted back to memories of his summers as a kid, running all around those hills, playing in the old hop kiln ruins, splashing in the creeks after a rain. It would be really hard to let all that go. But life goes on.

The lights flickered.

“Uh-oh,” said Pamela.

The house was plunged into darkness.

Dan waited in the dark for a moment for the lights to go back on. Power failures like this were not infrequent, especially when the fall storms blew in from the Pacific. Sometimes the lights came right back on, but at other times the blackout could last for hours.

After a few minutes, Dan rose with a sigh from his chair. Feeling his way through the nearly pitch-black dark, with the flicker of lightning to help him, he went into the dining room and found the drawer where he kept a flashlight and candles. He pulled it open, felt inside — no flashlight.

“Honey, where’s the flashlight?”

“I don’t know. Maybe Jacob took it.”

With a mild expletive he felt around some more, found a couple of candles and a lighter. He took them out and lit them, distributing them about the room.

A warm glow pushed back the darkness.

“I love candles,” said Pamela. “They’re much nicer than flashlights.”

Lightning flickered in the picture window, followed a moment later by a roll of thunder.

“Kind of romantic, don’t you think?” said Pamela.

Dan went over to the phone and picked it up to report the outage. The phone line was also dead. He replaced the receiver in the cradle. “Phone line’s down.”

“Good. I rather like this.”

It occurred to him that the power might be out over at the Pearce house, and that brought a fresh concern to his mind. “I hope Jacob’s not in the dark.”

“Honestly, Dan, what a worrier you are! You said he had a fire going. And I’m sure he has that flashlight you’re looking for. He’s a responsible, capable boy.”

“Right. Okay, good point.”

Dan got back in his chair, resting a little uneasily, crossing and recrossing his legs. The uneasy feeling increased.

“Well,” said Pamela, “it’s after midnight, and it’s too dim to read.” She paused, looking at Dan. “What do we do now?”

“Might as well go to sleep.”

A silence, and then she said, “I have a better idea. A famous blackout tradition.”

“What’s that?”

Dan stared as she started unbuttoning her shirt.

“Right here? In the living room?”

“Why not? We hardly ever get a night alone.”