Infinity + One

Jason Clyde frowned. “I talked to Bonnie. She didn’t seem crazy.”

“Oh, she’s crazy.” Finn tried to laugh and couldn’t, it hurt too damn much. So he continued on. “She’s crazy . . . but not in a bad way. In the best way. She’s impulsive and unpredictable. And she’s sad.” Finn’s gritted his teeth against the ache in his chest, thinking about the way she’d looked that night on the bridge, her face tear-stained and her hair in ragged blonde spikes. It was amazing to him she was as sane as she was, considering the family she was raised in.

“But in spite of that sadness, she still laughs. She still loves. She’s kind and way too generous for her own good.” He shook his head helplessly. “She’s also completely impossible, and I want to wring her neck half the time.”

“That’s not bipolar. That’s just a complicated woman. She sounds like your mom.”

“Yeah.” Finn’s smile was pained. “She’s a little like Fish too.”

“And that’s hard for you. Because you’re afraid she’ll end up like Fish. You’re afraid you’ll lose your other half, just like you did before.”

“So I’m afraid? That’s the simple answer?” Finn said, exasperated.

“Yes.” His father nodded. ‘Yes. That’s the simple answer.”

Finn felt the anger burst in his chest like a bomb had gone off—a ticking time bomb, set and counting down since the day his dad had moved far, far away from his family, from his sons who had needed him.

“I need to get out, Dad.”

“Finn—”

“I need to get out, Dad!” Finn shouted, his hand on the door handle.

Jason Clyde pulled into the parking lot of a Chinese Restaurant with a quick squeal of tires and a tap on his brakes, and Finn was out before the car was completely stopped.

His father followed him, the doors to the grey rental hanging open, the car parked haphazardly, chiming insistently that the key was still in the ignition. It reminded him of the morning he’d kissed Bonnie in the Motel 6 parking lot, angry, frustrated, confused—already in love and unable to find a rational explanation for it. The memory made his legs weak, and he walked to the curb and sat abruptly.

His father sat beside him, leaving a few feet between them, but he reached out and touched Finn’s shoulder tentatively.

“Finn. You’re scared. Scared doesn’t mean weak. You’re not weak. Don’t misunderstand. You’re one of the strongest people I’ve ever known. You’re loyal. You’re steady. And I am in awe of you, son.”

Finn wanted to shake his father off, but he held himself still, waiting.

“I am in awe of you,” his father said again, emphatically, and Finn fought the rising flood inside of him with all his strength, feeling the cracks that raced and widened, threatening to break him open.

“But you are afraid, Finn. And as long as you’re afraid, you won’t ever get what you want. Take it from someone who has been afraid his entire life.” His dad’s voice broke. “You’re afraid of being like me. You’re afraid of losing yourself in the numbers, of not being there for the people who need you. You’re afraid of being who you are . . . and you’re afraid that who you are isn’t enough.”

Finn flinched, panting at the effort it took to keep his defenses in place. He wanted to bury his head in his hands, but his dad wasn’t through chipping away, though he did so softly, sympathetically, his hand never leaving Finn’s shoulder.

“You’re afraid you love Bonnie too much. You’re afraid that she’ll tell you to go, the way your mother told me to go. From the moment I married your mom, I was afraid of losing her. I fed that fear with the focus of a true mathematician. Mind over matter, they say. So when she told me she wanted a divorce, I wasn’t even surprised. I was almost relieved that I didn’t have to be afraid anymore.” Jason Clyde smiled sadly. “And if I know you, Infinity, you’ve been expecting this result from day one. You’ve been anticipating the end from the beginning.”

His father was quiet beside him for several long seconds, as if he were deliberating whether to say anymore.

“And you’re probably afraid she’ll be like Fisher, constantly getting you in trouble. And from what I can see, you might have reason to fear, in that regard.”

Finn’s dad wasn’t trying to be funny—he was deadly serious—which was what made his final statement hilarious, and Finn found himself laughing weakly as the remains of his fury receded—the flood of truth deafening and devastating, but mercifully quick and surprisingly liberating.

“If we’re being honest, that’s one of the things I like best about her,” Finn confessed. “It’s one of the things I loved about Fish, even though I pretended to hate it. I never felt more alive, more conscious, than I did with Fish. Not until Bonnie.”

“So what do you want, Finn?”

“I want to run far away and never look back. I want to lose myself in formulas and equations and patterns and numbers and never resurface. I never want to see my face on a magazine or a television show again. And I sure as hell don’t want to go back to jail.”

His dad’s jaw slackened in surprise.

“But I want Bonnie more. I want her more than all of those things put together.”

“So what are you going to do?”

“I’m going to hope and pray that she still believes in Bonnie and Clyde.”