Have You Seen Jeremy Bright?

Have You Seen Jeremy Bright?Michael Devereaux Copyright © 2023 Michael DevereauxAll Rights Reserved*****No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods without prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. ONEJocelyn Bright closed the door of their ensuite bathroom, her husband, Ben, on the other side. He hummed as he showered. Jocelyn listened for a moment. Sounded like… “Freebird”? Yes, Freebird. Joss—as nearly everyone called her—raised the blinds covering the three windows that overlooked the small woods and creek behind their property. She spied a doe and her fawn nibbling at something on the ground. As if they could feel her gaze, they raised their heads and stared at her window. A few nights recently, she’d heard owls hooting. Their calls gave her shivers; the birds sounded like people imitating owls.She liked this view from their second-floor bedroom, liked that it was private. The nearest neighbor behind was across the little stream, up a hill, and the two houses were well-hidden from each other by the narrow band of trees. She slid into her yoga leggings and an Under Armour sports bra with half-zip pullover. Twisted her dirty-blond hair into a knot and patted it flat on the back of her head. No-show socks and her Saucony runners in teal completed her ensemble.She glanced back at the bathroom door before leaving the bedroom. Ben was still humming, but he’d switched to “Thunder Road”. She stared at the door a moment, then went into the hall, closing the door behind her.Her runners made that distinctive scff-scff sound unique to rubber against synthetic carpet fibers. She’d wanted the wool carpet when they remodeled, but Ben thought it was too expensive for what you got. He’d reminded her that he’d bought her a new kitchen with the stainless-steel appliances she wanted, and they had to cut costs somewhere.“Of course,” she’d agreed. She did enjoy the new Wolf induction cooktop in the center of her granite-covered island.Ben had only just been promoted to head of his department at Baptist Medical Center when they tore out the old kitchen. He’d worked years to become one of the best ophthalmic surgeons in Winston-Salem, but never forgot his lean upbringing by his preacher father and Christian schoolteacher mother in South Carolina. Sometimes spending money came hard to him.Joss paused by her son, Jeremy’s, door. Listened a moment to make sure he wasn’t dressing or something. She knocked, waited, knocked again. Eased open the door.His room was empty, his bed neatly made with the tight corners he’d learned from the ROTC instructor. She stood a moment, leaning on the door frame, arms folded, as she contemplated the empty room. It would soon be vacant more or less permanently when Jeremy went off to college on the scholarship he’d earned through the ROTC program. He intended to follow in his father’s footsteps and become a doctor, but he also wanted to serve in the military. Joss had tried to talk him out of it; an eight-year military commitment was a long time. Besides, they could pay for his college—he didn’t need the Army to do it.“The boy knows what he wants,” Ben had said during one of their many discussions on the matter, beaming at their 17-year-old. Ben hadn’t served, having had a heart flutter that kept him from enlisting. Joss was afraid her husband was living vicariously through their son the military career denied him.“Yeah, Mom,” Jeremy had said. “I know what I want. And after I get out, I can come and work with Dad.”She’d shaken her head, outnumbered. The day Jeremy went off to serve, she prayed there would be no wars for the generals to send him to. She supposed doctors were treated well in the Army, better than foot soldiers with all their guns and bombs and such.She went into his room, brushing her palms over the comforter atop the double mattress, even though there were zero wrinkles in the green-and-blue stripe-print fabric. She didn’t know how he made the covers so tight; she couldn’t do it, though he’d tried to show her.He did look handsome in his uniform, she had to admit. And so proud when he wore it, she couldn’t bring herself to lecture him about the dangers of military life.She looked around his room. He had three football trophies he kept on the shelf he and his father had mounted on the wall over his dresser. It had taken the two men—because she had to admit, Jeremy was a man now—all day one Saturday to fasten the thing to the wall. Honestly, a brilliant eye surgeon and the smartest kid she’d ever known, taking hours to do something she’d done often, and in a fraction of the time. But, she supposed, it wasn’t how efficient they were at it, but that they were doing it as father and son.She left the room and closed his door. A habitual early riser, Jeremy had likely already gone off to school for early ROTC training. Across the hall, she tapped on her daughter’s door.“Maddie, darling,” she said. “Time to get up.”A single groan emanated from within, then nothing. Joss smiled. Where Jeremy was as disciplined as they came, her fifteen-year-old daughter, Maddie, gave the term mercurial new meaning.Joss didn’t bother knocking again; it never did any good. She went in, straight to the curtains, pulling them open and letting the full glory of the April sunshine blast across her daughter’s face. Another groan, and Maddie pulled the covers of her black duvet over her head.Joss smiled and shook her head. Madison Bright had been going through a bit