The Gloves Come Off._ # _The Gloves Come Off_ _When she thought he was going to kiss her, she pulled away._ _"Excuse me?" said J.D. "What are you doing?"_ _He backed off._ _"You can tell Dr. Wilbur I'm not into that_ _'Sides, I'm married."_ J.D. put down the page. He blinked rapidly. He couldn't stop the images playing in his head. He shook his head. No, he couldn't do it. He couldn't become a doctor. Not the kind of doctor he used to be. He couldn't hurt a patient the way he'd hurt that poor girl. He rose from the table and put the magazine back in the drawer. He had to leave the building before anyone saw him. No one ever knew what went on in those locked offices behind closed doors. J.D. picked up the glass of milk and the cookie on the way out. * * * J.D. parked his Jeep Wagoneer on the street in front of his house. He should just park the damn thing and walk in, but he couldn't face dealing with the mess. He hadn't been home since he'd left in the middle of the night to go see the psychiatrist. He'd left several messages with the office receptionist, but she hadn't returned them. Probably because he wasn't a regular patient, and she didn't know who to call to tell him the doctor was in a session. J.D. sighed and walked up the front steps to the house. He put the milk and cookie on the stone console table and walked through the foyer to the living room. The place was a mess. Not from being trashed or rumpled. The room hadn't been used. There was no furniture. No toys or games or puzzles or Legos. He hadn't unpacked his boxes of keepsakes from childhood. He hadn't left his books on the shelves. J.D. felt as if he'd seen a ghost. A ghost who belonged to someone else. A brother he never knew he had. He ran to the bedroom. No boxes. No packing material. Nothing left behind. He looked in the bathroom. No toothbrush, no shaving kit, no soap or razor or razor blades or shampoo. Nothing but his old toiletry bag, like he'd never taken them with him. J.D. ran from the house and across the street. His father's mailbox held a large brown envelope. He tore it open and took out the stack of letters. They weren't handwritten; they'd been typed on a typewriter. The first one read: _You were a nice kid, J.D., for a couple of days, until I got sick and we had to leave your mother. You don't remember. I know you don't._ _I never had any kids. Never wanted to be a father. But I liked you. You didn't like me at first. You wouldn't sit on my lap or let me read to you. But you liked me._ _One day you wouldn't go to bed. You cried. I read you a story about a girl who didn't have any parents, and she was sad because she wanted to go to school and her teacher told her she wasn't allowed to go to school because she didn't have any parents, either. She cried and cried until she had three parents: The teacher, who felt sorry for her; the boy, who felt sorry for her; and the lady, who thought it was a nice story._ _You wouldn't go to school after that. You were afraid they'd take you away, but they never did. And one day you finally took your first step._ _I used to think about it sometimes. What if you weren't really sick? What if you were pretending? That I could get you back?_ _I'd find someone else, and then we'd go and buy you toys and be happy. But you would be happy anyway, and you didn't need to be kept safe and happy and fed and_ _loved. You could stay home and play. And you would have a new mommy._ _I didn't know what it was like to have a new mommy. I knew it was bad._ _I knew it was bad, but when I met your mom, I didn't think about any of those things. I didn't know what it was like to be a dad. I never told her that I wasn't a dad. I know she wouldn't have believed me._ _I never even told my own parents. Never said they couldn't take you away. Never said I couldn't let you play outside. I thought you were happy. And if you were happy, I was happy._ _Now I've been sitting by myself for months thinking about how good it would be if you came back. Forget about the last month. Forget about how I hurt your mom. Forget all that._ _I have another son, and he would take care of her, and she would be all right. I would watch her._ _You would tell me about what school you were going to go to, and I would come and see you after school and get you and take you home and talk with your teachers and tell them that I was the father and they shouldn't let you go. And they would believe me. They would believe me because my wife, who was a real mom, could back me up._ _And they would let you stay home and I would drive you to school. I'd watch you go to school, and I'd sit in the car and cry and cry._ _If you do come back, if you do think about coming back, it's a two-way street. They're not going to give me back my son. Not just any son. It's going to take a while. You might have to wait. But when you come back, we'll get married, and we'll get some land and a house. We'll have a family, and I'll be a good father._ _It won't be easy. I won't pretend it will. The real thing is hard and a lot of times you make mistakes and sometimes it's too hard. Sometimes you hate each other. The two of us together will have a hard time, but if you think you want to come back, I will hold you tight and try to make it all better._ _You could leave, you know. And you could walk away. But you're not going to. It doesn't mean I don't think I did a bad thing. It doesn't change how I feel about you. If you could forgive me, I'd like that. But don't ever think I don't want you back. I always want you back._ _Love, D._ J.D. ran back to his Jeep. He threw the letter onto the seat and looked down the street. He grabbed the gun from his glove compartment and ran to the end of the block, where he hid behind the tree line in front of the abandoned house. He checked his watch. 2:05. If he stayed at the doctor's office, the kid and his mom would be here at three. He wanted to be out of there in ten minutes. He checked the clip in his gun. He'd brought it from college and had forgotten all about it. He didn't know how much ammunition he had, but he was pretty sure it was enough. He put the gun back in his pocket and made his way down the street to the backyard. The kid was there. He was standing on a chair, leaning over the deck railing, smoking a cigarette. The mom was washing dishes in the kitchen. J.D. walked up to the kid. The boy looked up, and J.D. could see his mother watching from the kitchen window. "Hi," he said. "My name's J.D. What's yours?" "I don't have a name." "You don't have a name?" "No," the boy said. "I don't have a name." He took a puff from his cigarette and looked around the yard. "Do you live here?" "No, my name's not J.D. I'm from the FBI." J.D. took a step closer. "And I need you to stay away from your parents." The mom came over to the window. "Who are you?" she called. "My name's J.D. I'm with the FBI." J.D. held up a badge and pushed it up close to the window. The mom said, "I thought you were my father. Why do you look so much like him?" The boy said, "Do you have a name, J.D.?" "No." J.D. smiled. He'd taken the name from a famous movie star, and the boy was a dead ringer for him. "Did you run away, J.D.?" the mom asked. "I didn't run away," said J.D. "I was sent here to take you back with me." "Back where?" asked the boy. "You can call