His Father Knew. For Three Days

The father opens with a grievance: the police, the door broken out at the country house, “some girl was on the phone half the day,” the neighbors. “Who’s going to pay for it?” Simon understands: the police were obliged to tell the owner of the house everything — the pills, the ambulance, the hospital. “His father knew. For three days.” And asked today — about the door. This continues the phone call from chapter sixteen (“Fury Instead of Fear”): to this man, his son is a line of expenses.

Simon’s answer is the first time things are called by their names in this house: “My whole childhood I thought you drank because my mother died. Then I understood: you would have drunk anyway. She just freed up your evenings. You’re not a father. You’re an alcoholic whose wife conveniently died — and whose son inconveniently survived.” Note the detail just before it: two days in another house — “and his own had gotten smaller.” That is how contrast works: until a person has seen something different, he cannot measure what was done to him. For the first time, neglect acquires a scale — and with the scale, words.