I had worked just as hard as I knew how to be the new and squeaky-clean straight-arrow family man I was supposed to be, and at each attempt I had been slapped down, sneered at, and utterly crushed. Irritation grew inside me and morphed into anger, and then that started to change, too, as I felt a cold and acid bath of contempt burble up inside: contempt for Brian, and Rita, and Deborah, and Cody and Astor, for all the dribbling idiots in the whole stumble-footed world -and most of all, contempt for me, Dexter the Dummkopf, who wanted to walk in the sunlight, smelling the flowers and watching rainbows curl across the rose-tinted sky. But I had forgotten that the sun is nearly always hidden by clouds, flowers have thorns, and rainbows are always out of reach. You could dream the impossible dream all you wanted to, but it was always gone when you woke up. I was finding that out the hard way, each new reminder grinding my nose further and further into the dirt, and now all I really wanted was to grab something by the throat and squeeze The monotonous drone of Rita and the kids saying their prayers came down the hall at me. I still didn't know the words, and it was just one more annoying reminder that I was not really Dex-Daddy and probably never would be. I thought I could be the first leopard in history to change his spots, but in reality I was just another alley cat forced to dine on garbage.

I stood up. I just needed to move around, try to calm down, collect my thoughts, tame these weird and wild and brand-new emotions, before they carried me away on a flood tide of stupidity. I walked into the kitchen, where the dishwasher was already whirring away at the dinner dishes. Past the refrigerator, its ice-maker clicking. I walked into the back hall by the washer and dryer. All around me, through the whole house, everything was clean and functional, all the machinery of domestic bliss, in its place and ready to do exactly what it was supposed to do-all of it but me. I was not made to fit under the counter of this or any other house. I was made for moonlight gleaming off a very sharp knife and the soothing ratchet of duct tape purring off the roll and the muffled horror of the wicked in their neat and careful bonds as they met their unmaker But I had turned my back on that, turned away from all I really was, tried to fit myself into a picture of something that did not even exist, like squeezing a demon onto a Saturday Evening Post cover, and I had done nothing but make myself look like a complete idiot. No wonder Brian could so easily take away my kids. I would never bring them away from the dark side if I couldn't even give them a convincing performance of virtuous normality.

And with such a vast amount of wickedness in the world, how could I beat my bright blade into a dull and functional plowshare? There was so much yet to do, so many playground bullies who needed to learn the new rules to the game, Dexter's rules-there were even cannibals abroad in my very own city. Could I really just sit on the couch and knit while they worked their horrible will on the Samantha Aldovars of the world? After all, she was somebody's daughter, and someone felt about her just the way I felt about Lily Anne.

And as that thought hit home a red-hot surge of anger roared up inside me, burning away all my careful control. It could have been Lily Anne. Someday it still could be, and I was doing nothing to protect her. I was a self-deluded fool. I was being attacked from all sides, and I was simply letting it happen. I was allowing the predators to stalk and slay, and if someday they came for Lily Anne-or Cody and Astor-it would be my fault. It was in my power to protect my family from a very nasty world, and instead I was pretending that kind thoughts would keep the dragon away, while in fact it was roaring at my very own door.

I stood at the back door and looked out the window into the darkness of the yard. The clouds had rolled in up above, covering over the moon and bringing complete darkness. That was it, a perfect picture of all that was real; just darkness, hiding a few patches of brown grass and dirt. Nothing worked. Nothing ever worked, not for anyone anywhere. It was all just darkness, decay, and dirt, and trying to pretend there was anything else got you nothing but grief, and there was not a thing I could do about it. Nothing.

… And the clouds rolled open to let one small moonbeam trickle through to light up the darkness, and the sibilant whisper tickled and teased once more and said, There is one thing…

And that one simple thought made all the sense in the world.

"I'll be right back," we said to Rita as she sat on the couch with the baby held close. "I left some things at work."

"Back?" she warbled in confusion. "You mean you're going to-But it's night!"

"Yes, it is," we said, and we let a cold gleam of teeth show in our face at the thought of that welcoming velvet darkness just outside the door.

"Well, but don't you-Can't it wait until morning?" she said.

"No," we said, and the happy madness of it echoed in our voice. "It can't wait. It's something I need to do tonight."

The truth of it clearly showed on our face. Rita frowned but said no more than, "Well, I hope you-Oh! But I emptied the diaper pail, and it's really-Could you take the bag and-" She jumped up and went into the hall and the cold acid roiled through me at the interruption, but she was back in mere seconds, clutching a garbage bag. She thrust it at me and said, "On your way out, if you-You really have to go in? I mean, it won't take too long? Because, I mean, drive carefully, but-"

"It won't take long," we said, and then impatience flooded in and we were out the door into the welcoming night with its thin fingers of moonlight trickling through the clouds and promising that one wonderful thing that could wash away all the cramped misery of trying to be something we were not and never would be. In a hurry now, we flung the garbage bag onto the floor of the backseat with our playtime toys and got into the car.

We drove north through thin traffic, north to work, just as we had said we would, but not the daytime work of office and disorder; we went to a much happier task, beyond the dull and into delight, north past the airport, onto the off-ramp that led to North Miami Beach, and slower now, carefully nosing down the trail in our memory, to a certain small pastel yellow house in a modest neighborhood.

The club doesn't even open until eleven, Deborah had said. We drove past with care and saw the lights on, inside and out, and a car in the driveway that had not been there before. The mother's car, of course, and it made perfect sense-she took it to work during the day. Closer to the house, half into the shadows, was the Mustang. He was still here. It was not yet ten o'clock and the drive to South Beach was not a long one. He would be inside, enjoying his unjust freedom and thinking that all was once more right with his little world, and that was just the way we wanted it. We had made it with plenty of time and we felt a cold and pleasing certainty that we would not be disappointed.

We went one time around the block and watched for any sign that things were not what they should be and we found nothing. All was quiet and safe and all the little houses were clean and lighted and buttoned up against the razor-sharp fangs of the night.

We drive on. Four blocks away there is a house with a Dumpster squatting in its overgrown yard and this was just what we wanted. The houses nearby are dark, too, one light showing in a place two doors away, but otherwise it is all a quiet part of our night, and the house with the Dumpster is perfect. Foreclosed, empty, waiting for somebody to come in with a new dream, and very soon somebody will, but it will not be a pretty dream. We find a broken streetlight a block away and park there, beside a hedge. We get out slowly, enjoying the anticipation, enjoying as always the happy task of preparation, making things just right for all that had to happen and now would happen once more and oh so soon.