The Choice

know I might need help. There wasn’t time.
I wouldn’t shut him down. I would ride the wave of his intention to
its consequence. “What if you kill her right now?” I said.
“I’m going to do it!”
“What will happen?”
“She deserves it. She’s got it coming. She’s going to regret every lie
she ever told me.”
“What will happen to you if you kill your wife?”
“I don’t care!” He was pointing the gun at me, right at my chest,
gripping it with both hands, his finger frozen near the trigger.
Was I a target? Could he take his rage out on me? Pull the trigger
by mistake, send a bullet flying? There wasn’t time to be afraid.
“Do your children care?” I was acting on instinct.
“Don’t mention my children,” Jason hissed. He lowered the gun a
fraction. If he pulled the trigger now he would shoot my arm, my
chair, not my heart.
“Do you love your children?” I asked. Anger, however consuming,
is never the most important emotion. It is only the very outer edge, the
thinly exposed top layer of a much deeper feeling. And the real feeling
that’s disguised by the mask of anger is usually fear. And you can’t feel
love and fear at the same time. If I could appeal to Jason’s heart, if I
could get him to feel love for even a second, it might be long enough
to interrupt the signal of fear that was about to become violence.
Already his fury was on pause. “Do you love your children?” I asked
again.
Jason wouldn’t answer. It was as though he was stuck in the cross-
hairs of his own competing feelings.
“I have three kids,” I said. “Two daughters, one son. What about
you?”
“Both,” he said.
“A daughter and a son?”