Shad almost choked on the salad he was unfortunate enough to be swallowing right when he felt the impulse to chuckle. He coughed and sputtered a bit, then reached for his glass of tea to help finish washing the lettuce down.

Karl’s thumb redirected toward Shad as his attention returned to Jill. “See what you made me almost do to poor Shad?”

Jill completely ignored the question and asked Stan to pass her the rolls. Shad, naturally sitting as far away from her as possible, noticed the butter dish had remained at his end of the table, and he suddenly remembered what he had been assigned to do. Shad picked up the butter dish and held it in front of Dulsie.

“Jill, you want some butter with that?” His voice was still a little raspy.

Hopefully Shad was only imagining that complete silence reigned at the table. Two seconds, three seconds....

“Mom.” Dulsie spoke up. “Shad asked if you wanted any butter with your roll.”

Jill glanced toward Dulsie and demurely replied, “No thank you.”

Shad set the butter dish down, and then he felt Dulsie’s leg rub against his calf.

The opportunity arose again the next afternoon following First Day meeting. The families had lunch together before Erin’s group would head home, and Shad started passing out drinks of tea or juice. He asked Jill if she wanted anything. And again Jill didn’t respond.

Dulsie was just as quick to challenge her mother’s selective hearing. “Mom,” she said in a clear voice, “Shad asked if you wanted something to drink.”

Jill glanced casually toward her daughter and nonchalantly responded, “No thank you.”

Shad wondered how long Jill would give up food and drink just to keep ignoring him. Maybe trying to reconnect with Jill wouldn’t be so unsettling after all. Dulsie had his back, and Shad had to admit he was starting to find Jill’s response – or lack thereof – a bit humorous.

Then the time came for Erin’s family to leave, and they all exchanged hugs with her group. Ida was the last of the family to give a hug to Shad. He had stooped to be more accessible to the kids’ levels, and when Ida wrapped her arms around his neck she playfully jumped toward Shad, knocking him a little off balance and causing his own arms to tighten around her.

“Easy,” Shad gasped.

To his dismay, the primal urging flooded through him.

The waters of the Osage River were not consistently clear. Only ten miles or so downstream of the Delaney farm it entered the Missouri River which had long ago earned the nickname “Big Muddy.” Upstream the flow of the Osage was impounded twice to create Truman Reservoir and the Lake of the Ozarks. Therefore the river was rather rich in nutrients, which encouraged the growth of algae that often cast a greenish murk to the water that would limit visibility below its surface. It was clean enough to swim in, however, and even though any rain had stayed to the north and west for several days, feeding the river’s tributaries, the water was reasonably clear as the level lingered at the lower stages and the current was gentle.

The three couples had planned on an afternoon of swimming at the river after Erin’s family left, so Shad brought a pair of blue swim trunks for him to wear at the Osage. As he basically swam diagonal laps to the middle of the river and back, Shad simmered mentally on the episode he’d experienced with Ida. For him, swimming or hiking were both executed automatically, and his mind could usually focus more effectively during these activities.

Pap had seen to it all his kids became efficient swimmers, and Shad, who seemed to lack refined athletic ability even though his physique might suggest otherwise, had exceeded expectations. Wally had taken him to the pool when Shad was little and even enrolled him in some lessons. Then for four years Shad did no swimming at all until he was brought to the Delaneys. Under Pap’s tutelage and a few sessions with a private tutor, Shad became as proficient as Pap, who had long held the record on being the strongest swimmer in the family. Shad knew he excelled at this one skill because he enjoyed swimming so much and had therefore worked on it, much as he was more of a fisherman than a hunter. When Shad went fishing he focused on trying to catch fish, but whenever he would go hunting Shad was more content just to be out in the solitude of the wilderness and didn’t care if he bagged any game or not.

While Shad swam, instinctively working with the currents of the river, he pondered a reality that had surfaced in his conscious after the experience with Ida. His demon gave no quarter to family members. Not only was Ida his niece, she was Erin’s daughter. Erin, who could have simply alerted Social Services to Shad’s situation, had instead turned him on a path that not only saved him but saved God only knew how many others. Shad’s gratitude to Erin only deepened his shame about Ida, and the veracity of his shame made him contemplate a possibility so horrendous he couldn’t bear to examine it in detail.

Shad and Dulsie planned on having a family someday. They could have a daughter.

Even though Shad was determined to never exploit a child’s vulnerability, the mere idea he could feel that impulse toward his own daughter sickened him. Yet Shad had learned today his perfectly natural revulsion had no suppressive power over the unnatural force that lurked inside him. Even if the disorder went back into latency, Shad had no guarantee if or when it could surface again. All he knew for sure was that he didn’t want to live with the specter of harboring something so vile toward his own children.

Shad now hoped that Brody did injure him enough to eliminate any chance of paternity, but he also couldn’t take chances on hope. Shad was going to have to say something to Dulsie, and he’d better say it quickly since they’d already ended their efforts to avoid just such an event. But the truth was too terrible to share, so how was he going to explain his sudden change of heart?

It was true everybody knew he was a proponent of adoption, so to some extent it would make sense if Shad said he wanted to adopt. But how would he explain a preference for children over six years old or only males? Besides, he knew Dulsie looked forward to the experience of childbearing. And she was quite keen on bearing his children, despite the matter that Shad had little knowledge of what exactly might be lurking in his genes.

Maybe now would be a good time to assign more importance to that hitherto mild reservation. Link that to the desire to adopt ... yeah, he could give reasonable arguments why they would be better off not beginning with an infant ... and Shad believed he might be able to convince Dulsie she didn’t need to experience pregnancy.

His flash of relief was quickly dimmed by a subtle but sudden new dread.

He was plotting subterfuge against his own wife. One of the basic cornerstones of Friends belief Shad had taken to heart first was the exhortation to adhere to a single standard of truth. One must speak plainly and honestly. Yet here he was, contemplating the fabrication of an alternative “truth,” and Shad intended to use it as a means to persuade Dulsie to deviate from their original plan.

But he couldn’t tell her the real truth. It was too personal to both of them. Dulsie’s image of him would be shattered and she would be thrown into a nightmarish angst about what she had married. No, Shad would cause less harm to her by crushing some of her dreams in order to urge Dulsie to replace them with new dreams.

This wasn’t fair.

Shad felt distinctly trapped in a situation that seemed to condemn him to hurt Dulsie no matter what he did. All Shad had control over was to what degree he would hurt her. It would appear that Jill, as always, had been right.