"Stollen"

Part Three in the Four Part 'Brandon' Series

Jeffrey M. Kellen

 

‘In the sheltered simplicity of the first days after a baby is born, one sees again the magical closed circle, the miraculous sense of two people existing only for each other’ ~Anne Morrow Lindbergh

“Making the decision to have a child - it's momentous. It is to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your body”~ Elizabeth Stone

 

"If I could snap my fingers and become non-autistic I would not do so. Autism is part of who I am."~Temple Grandin 

 

August 2003

 (AP) BRIDGEPORT, IN—COMMUNITY HYPE FOR COMET ARRIVAL REACHES FEVER PITCH

 The residents of Bridgeport are coming together like they never have before in recent weeks in anticipation of a sighting of a lifetime, and the chance to create some memories for their grandchildren. All for something that will be no closer than roughly half a million miles away.

The local buzz started nearly two months ago when it was announced by officials from NASA that Comet Bennett (named after the astronomer John Caister Bennett) was going to be best seen from the sleepy little hamlet of Bridgeport, Indiana. Ever since then, the residents of this town located nearly forty-five miles northeast of Fort Wayne, Indiana have taken advantage of their celebrity status and then some. Everything from T-shirts to coffee mugs to mouse pads with the town’s crest are being created and marketed to the huge influx of comet thrill seekers expected to arrive later in the week when the comet is supposed to be at its brightest. Despite the newfound celebrity status, not all residents are happy about the potential consequences of thousands of new inhabitants descending upon the town.

“It’s just not right, all these newcomers comin’ in and making a ruckus,” said Earle Satchett, a resident who built his first home in the town in 1946 after returning home from the war. “I just don’t trust ‘em, and all for what? To see some stinkin’ comet.”

Nonetheless, Satchett’s voice of disapproval seems to be in the clear minority as the mayor himself, the Right Honorable Mason Thornton III has now declared this coming Saturday Comet Bennett Day in honor of the grand event.

“It’s a time for all of us to come together as a community,” the mayor said, “and celebrate our overall humanity, that despite all of our differences, we really all share this planet together as one people.”

Most of the sightseers are expected to gather around McKinley Point just outside of town for optimal viewing conditions. And, despite rumors of what comets have been known to bring in the past, including widespread death, hysteria, and whatever other strange concoction man’s chimerical mind can come up with, it seems that a record turnout is expected late Saturday night to take in this unusually historical event.

Five Years Later

“Come here, Stephen, he’s doing it again,” Emily said to her husband of nearly eleven years now. “Come on, hurry, you’re gonna miss it like last time.” Stephen backed himself away from the office computer to see what his wife was talking about. From behind his thick lenses (he was probably the only one that he knew of that had needed bifocals by the ripe old age of thirty-three) he could see his pretty wife staring into the playroom that his two oldest boys, Mike and Jacob, had long since abandoned for more mature hobbies such as playing their PS3 or two-hand touch football in their rather ample backyard. Nowadays, the sole occupant of the room was mostly Brandon, their nearly five-year-old son who seemed pretty much to enjoy himself in there on his own for hours on end. Emily had wondered aloud to him the other day if it was so normal for a child to play by themselves for so long in lieu of the fact of having two older brothers (despite the six year age difference). Stephen had fairly well summarily dismissed it at the time, saying not all kids were the same and that he would eventually “grow out of it.”

“Stephen, will you get over here?,” Emily hissed now, getting visibly annoyed with her husband. “You’re gonna miss it!”

Stephen sauntered over next to his wife wondering just what the hell was so important that his doctoral thesis (“Early Twentieth-Century Irish Literature and Its Impact on the Surrealist Movement”) had to be interrupted. “I mean, it’s not like the kid is dyin’ in there, is it?” he thought to himself. What he saw next was something that took the thirty-five-year-old English professor aback so suddenly that he had to hold onto the door jamb for support.

There were actually two things of note, each of them as unique as the other.

The first, and most impressive of the sights, was array of Lincoln Logs that had been spread about all over the playroom in some vast, complex system that reminded him of how early Mayan cities were often arranged. Stephen had to wonder if his son had not been suddenly inhabited by some lost soul stolen out of an elderly city planner or some genius engineer from M.I.T. The most startling aspect of it all was the intricate detail of everything, how complex it all appeared. Buildings, towers, and other obscure structures were knitted so tightly together that it would have been impossible to arrange such a spectacle unless one had the power to levitate so as to not knock down the adjoining structures. Every single log had been used and not a spare inch of floor remained uncovered. Stephen was just about to dash off to get their new Canon digital camera to record this incredible creation when he noticed his son, heavy blond curls and all, was sitting in the far distant corner, and not entirely still.

When he adjusted his wire-rim glasses so he could focus a little better, he wasn’t quite sure, but it looked as if his son was mostly still except for his left hand which was mildly undulating up and down in front of him as if he were holding an imaginary bottle of ketchup and trying to empty its contents. He also appeared to be mumbling to himself, but in the silent house (both his brothers were out and about playing in the neighborhood with their friends), whatever he was (or appeared to be) saying was not audible to them.

“See, see! And you thought I was crazy, didn’t you?” Emily said while nudging her husband. “He’s been doing that for the past three days now.”

“How long has he been working on that, that town of his, Em?” Stephen asked, still straining to see if his son was actually saying anything.

“Just since this morning, I suppose. Right after he woke up he went straight in there.”

“Wait a minute, are you telling me he’s only been doing this for a few hours?”

“Yeah, this room was clean after I put away everything last night,” she said. “Stephen, that thing he’s doing with his arm—what is that? That’s not normal, is it?”

Emily looked at her husband almost pleadingly as if instead of being a tenured professor at IPFW that he was, instead, some regular MD doing his normal morning rounds.

“Gee, Emily, how the hell should I know? I mean, kids do all kinds of things, it doesn’t mean we should freak out about it for crying out loud.”

“I’m freaking out, Stephen, I’m just concerned about our son!” Stephen could tell his wife was starting to get upset now. The tiny freckles on her face were becoming isolated pinpricks on her cheeks due to her flushed countenance which usually meant she was either aroused or upset. Somehow he felt it was not the former.

“Well, what do you expect me to do about it, anyway? I say we just give it a couple of days, and if he still doesn’t stop doing what he’s doing in there with his arm, then maybe you should schedule an appointment with Dr. Patel.”

“Stephen, it’s not just that. Ever since he had that fever last week he hasn’t quite been the same. I mean, when I look in his eyes, they seem almost lifeless sometimes, like he’s not really there. And the other day when I was vacuuming he started screaming and hitting himself and ran off to his room. For God’s sake, Stephen, I’ve vacuumed a million times before and he’s never had that kind of reaction before.”

Stephen drew a heavy sigh and motioned his wife away from the entry to the playroom.

“Listen, babe, who’s to say if anything at all is going on, but if it makes you feel better, on Monday morning I’ll call and get Brandon into the doctor first thing. Until then, I think we should just do the smart thing and keep an eye on him and see if anything changes. Okay?”

Emily, though not quite assured by her husband’s words, shook her head in mute assent, and looked back at the playroom wondering just what on Earth could possibly be wrong her son. In her heart, her mother’s heart, she just knew something wasn’t quite right, and as a mother this was more frustrating than anything she could possibly imagine. Nonetheless, in her mind she couldn’t help but agree with her husband and decided to wait until Monday.

Until then, she would watch him like the proverbial hawk. If there was something wrong with her son, she wanted to be able to report everything she could.

August 2003

(AP) BRIDGEPORT, IN—COMET SIGHTING BRINGS RECORD TURNOUT AND A FEW SURPRISES

Comet Bennett was the star late Saturday night, and it did not disappoint.

Thousands of Bridgeport residents and several hundred more out-of-town visitors reported that the much-hyped event that had been anticipated for months was not a letdown in the least. Some even went on to say that it was a virtual religious experience for them.

 

“I went to church for the first time in twenty years,” Simon Fodels, a lifetime resident of Bridgeport stated after witnessing the spectacular event. “I think something’s changed inside of me, but I just can’t say what.”

Indeed, many others came away from the viewing feeling as if they had witnessed a true miracle instead of the celestial occurrence that it actually was. Many felt either symptoms of extreme euphoria or even the opposite, with more than a few experiencing extreme nausea the following day.

However, one Bridgeport resident seemed to experience neither, instead comparing the experience to that of an awakening of sorts.

“I-I don’t know how to describe it,” stated Emily Rothman, who, along with her husband, Stephen, was one of the first to make their way to McKinley Point. “It’s kind of like in that movie where that astronaut goes through this big, black shape and travels to some other dimension. I don’t know; it’s just really hard to describe.”

Indeed, the following weekend, Pastor Bob Shapron of First United Methodist reported a sixty-five percent increase in attendance from the church’s usual Sunday attendance.

When asked to account for the unusual increase in numbers, he only had this to say:

“Well, I’m no expert on astronomical phenomena, but when people experience a once-in-a-lifetime event like we did on the Saturday before last, it leaves an impression on people. They start to ask the big questions, like ‘Why are we here?’ or ‘Are we here for a reason?’ What can I say, but it’s our human nature to question things, and we do, it seems only natural for most to turn towards a higher power.”

December 2008

Stephen and Emily had been sitting uncomfortably in Dr. Patel’s waiting room for nearly forty miserable minutes before the nurse finally called them back in to one of the smaller rooms where they were anxiously awaiting to hear the test results on Brandon.

 

Stephen had not only called first thing that Monday after first discovering his son’s rather incredulous Lincoln Log creation and his unusual arm tick, but had insisted that he have the first possible appointment after another incident pushed his brain from suspicion mode to that of outright alarm.

On early Sunday morning, the following day, just before they were to leave for church, he had asked Jacob to get his brother from the playroom to get ready to go. After Jacob reported that his brother was basically ignoring him, Stephen had gone himself to see what in heaven’s name was keeping him.

When he got to the playroom, there he was again, sorting the Lincoln Logs like some mad scientist arranging his laboratory for some diabolical experiment. At first, Stephen was tempted to just stand there and let his son go to town, pardon the pun, but he knew that if they idled too much longer, his wife would be on him like white on rice.

“Hey buddy, time to go to church, little man,” he called out while taking a look at his watch. If they left soon, they’d be able to arrive just in time for the second service.

Brandon kept on playing and arranging his logs, his thick blond locks hanging down like so many vines in front of his face. His look of determination rivaled that of any track runner gearing up for his first heat.

“Come on, Brandon, you don’t want Mommy getting mad at us for being late to church now, do you?”

No response, just the same diligent pursuit of some wooden masterpiece that only he could envision. Stephen looked at his watch. Five minutes had now passed. Either they were going to have to hustle or miss church altogether, and that was something that just didn’t happen in the Rothman household. Not since elder Rothmans had witnessed Comet Bennett with several thousand others of their fellow Bridgeport residents. Brandon’s dad didn’t anger easily, but he was no man to be pushed, either.

“Brandon, this is your last warning. Get your butt out here, pronto!” he said, voice raised, but not quite shouting.

If, indeed, Stephen had let his so finish his latest architectural masterpiece, he would have seen that it vaguely resembled the Roman aqueducts that allowed them to reign supreme like they did for several hundred years. How a five-year-old from northeast Indiana could possibly be privy to such information was not really a question that Stephen was pondering at the moment. What was more important to him was the wrath of his wife he was going to incur if he didn’t get things in motion, and soon.

“Brandon!” Stephen yelled at the top of his lungs. And right there and then, all hell did break loose.

As if a firecracker had suddenly gone off under his son’s rear end, Brandon bolted upright from his creation with such force that his bevy of wooden instruments went flying in every direction possible. Not realizing the force of his own movement, Brandon slipped on some nearby logs, causing his head to crashing into one of his dexterous creations which had at one time resembled a water tower of infinite precision.

For a boy who had all but been silent for the last few days, what let loose from his throat caused the very flesh on the back of his father’s neck to rise in gooseflesh. His scream was not so much loud as it seemed to go several octaves higher than he had ever heard in any aria he had ever heard before. But that wasn’t the worst of it.

His son, now in an all out paroxysm, was thrashing about on the floor gyrating and kicking his legs as if he were fighting off some killer land shark that had unceremoniously made its way into the Rothman playroom. In addition to that, Stephen’s son had started biting his own forearm with such viciousness that had he not been wearing his favorite long-sleeved shirt with the Batman logo on it he might very well have started bleeding all over the scattered wooded logs all over the playroom.

Stephen dashed over his son to pick him up but not before receiving a rather rude blow to his face from one of his son’s flailing arms. After a few seconds of negotiating wrapping his arms around his son, he finally was able to pick him up and carry him into the living room where the rest of his family, now alerted by the banshee cry coming from the youngest member’s throat, was now coming to see what the holdup was.

That was nearly two weeks ago. Now, after an untold battery of tests and an excruciating wait that tested the human mind beyond its stretching point, Stephen and Emily were on the verge of finding out, hope against hope, just what might be wrong with their little boy.

Fortunately for them, the wait in the actual doctor’s room was not nearly as long as the one in the torturous waiting room. Within five minutes, Dr. Patel entered, flashing a rather toothy grin while holding a thick stack of folders. Emily thought to herself, Can it ever be a good thing when a doctor enters a room with enough documents to start a research paper? She reached out for her husband’s hand and grasped it firmly with her own.

“Thanks, guys, for waiting like that,” he started, his demeanor hardening just enough to show that he wasn’t some comedian coming out for open-mike night. “We’ve had this new strand of flu showing up that has our office just flooded today.”

Dr. Patel grabbed a shiny silver stool from the corner of the room and dragged over and sat squarely before the Rothmans who, by this point, looked like they were on trial for their lives instead of being two loving parents just waiting to find out what could possibly be causing their Brandon to behave so strangely.

“Well, as promised, Stephen and Emily, based on what you told me just under two weeks ago, I ordered a battery of tests for Brandon to help me confirm what my initial suspicions were. In addition to Brandon’s medical history, I ordered the M-Chat, a PDD screening, and a few other bits of alphabet soup that I really won’t go into. I can tell by your faces that you just want me to spit it out, so I will. Based on what you told me, the interviews conducted, and the results of the testing, it looks like your son has a moderate form of autism.”

“I-I’m sorry, doctor, could you repeat that again?” Emily stammered, her voice so dry from anticipation she could barely get the words out.

“Sorry, Emily, maybe I should have explained that before going into all this mumbo jumbo. Your son has autism which is a neurological disorder of the brain. Essentially it manifests itself by social impairments and other cognitive and communication struggles. I think the latest figure today is saying something like 1 in 110 are now born with this disorder, but that number has been dropping steadily over the last few years.”

Emily could barely speak. If someone had just sucker punched her gut, she would have felt no different. Cool beads of sweat had formed on her forehead, and the room was beginning to spin.

“Gosh, I’m so sorry, let me get you a drink of water, Emily,” Dr. Patel offered. “You’re starting to look a little pale there.” Emily took a few merciful sips and struggled to regain her composure.

“So, doctor, does this mean my son is r-retarded, then?”

“Well, quite frankly, Emily that word has fallen out of use because of all the negative stereotypes associated with it. But in a manner of speaking, yes, your son is going to, more than likely, have severe learning disabilities by the time he reaches school age. But Emily, and Stephen, too, I want to be clear about something here. This is going to go much further than that. You see, your son has a much different way of looking at the world now. It would be if I gave you some kaleidoscope glasses to put on, just imagine how things would look differently to you. That’s kind of how it is for your Brandon, but only in the mildest way. He’s never going to interact with you or other family members or anyone else the way your other two boys do. And by what you have already told me, it seems he has the very common characteristic of being overly sensitive to stimuli that you and I take for granted, like with the incident with you shouting out his name to him, Stephen.”

Stephen nodded his, remembering the incident with all too vividly now.

“I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but I just want to be as honest as I can with you. In fact, I have a couple of neurologists I want to share with you so we can get you get you folks all the help you need.”

By this time, Emily was openly weeping with tears streaming down her cheeks and bouncing lightly off a new cobalt top she had just purchased yesterday from Macy’s. When there was still time left before learning about this new and awful discovery. Already she was starting to frame her life in pre- and post-discovery, like a death had occurred unceremoniously in the middle of the night.

Emily spoke again through her tears, barely getting the words out.

“W-was this s-something we did? I mean, I’ve always taken care of Brandon, always did wh-what I thought was right. How could this be?”

At this point, Dr. Patel scooted a little closer to the mother who now had her face buried in one of her hands, no longer caring that what little makeup she had on her face was starting to streak crudely down her face.

“Emily, I want to be perfectly clear about one thing,” he said, now putting a reassuring hand on one of her shoulders. “This is something that is well beyond your control, and there is nothing either you or Stephen could have done to have prevented it, or even caused it for that matter.”

“Well, what does cause it then, doctor?” Stephen said for the first time, now taking over for his wife who was crying too hard to carry on with her line of questioning.

“Stephen, if I knew the answer to that, I’d probably be the recipient to next year’s Nobel prize winner in medicine. If you can name, it’s probably been suggested for a cause. Genetics. MMR shots. Toxins in the environment. Heck, I wouldn’t be surprised if someone came out with a study tomorrow that said that sunspots and cell phones were the culprit. The truth is, nobody really knows with 100% certainty, and if they try to tell you they do, well they’re just plain full of nonsense or they’re lying to you. But that doesn’t really matter now. What does matter is that you and your wife get the right tools and education on how to help your son the best, and I have no question in my mind that you will.”

After asking if they had any more questions, Dr. Patel said he would walk them back to the front part of the office where the secretary would get them the information they needed. After a somewhat perfunctory handshake to both, he left and quickly disappeared into the next patient room.

Stephen took the few papers the secretary handed him without smiling or looking at her and walked his wife back to their car with his arm around her attempting to console her the best he could. He didn’t even know or feel if he needed consoling himself. Was there anything really to be consoled about, for that matter?

The ride back home reminded Stephen of his first funeral he ever went to, where, even at the age of eleven, he knew there was this unspoken rule that you just didn’t talk at an occasion like this and the only sounds to be heard were soft weeping in the background. Funny he should think of such a dark subject at a time like this, but the feeling that a death had just occurred could not be shaken from his brain. Had his son really died as he had known him? God, now he was the one on the verge of tears.

Later that night, after all of their boys had been put down to sleep, Emily walked over to Stephen, who was busy distracting his mind with his thesis.

“Stephen, I need to talk to you a minute.”

“Honey, can it wait until tomorrow? My doctoral review is in two days and I really need to get this done,” he said without even looking up.

“No, Stephen, I need to share this now before I explode. It’s been on my mind ever since we left the doctor’s office this morning.”

Great, Stephen thought. First he finds out today his youngest has some strange neurological disease, and now he’s on the verge of finding out his wife has had an affair. What next, Lord…?

“Remember when we all went out to see that comet five years ago? Comet Bennett, I think it was called…”

“Uh, yeah, sure Em, why? What does all this have to do you and me?”

“Well, I never really told you, but you remember how we went home that night and made love for the first time in several weeks. I still remember the look on your face after me suggesting it to you, since you’re the one that’s usually the one that’s so gung ho to jump in the saddle.”

“Yeah, I do remember that, babe,” Stephen said, lightly chuckling to himself. As far as he knew, it was the last time that she was the instigator for their bedroom activities. What could he say, he was a guy? “Honey, I still don’t—”

“Wait a minute, just listen to me for a moment. After that next morning, after we had come back from church with Mike and Jacob, I could just swear that I knew that I was pregnant. Remember how shocked we were with both our first two?”

Stephen nodded his head, remembering how scared as hell they both were, even after finding out that Em was pregnant with a second child and here he was just a first-year prof at some dinky, junior college in Spitsville, Indiana.

“It’s been so long since then, but this feeling that there was now some new life in me was stronger than ever, but I was still too scared to share it with you until I found out for sure. But for those first few weeks before I decided to take the plunge and take a pregnancy test, I just knew in my heart of hearts that we had conceived. And that’s not all. There was something special about this one, something that I couldn’t put into words, not even now. It was like God Himself was speaking to me, but I just didn’t know what He was saying.”

“Emily Lauren Rothman, are you trying to tell me that a comet, some ball of dust and ice several hundreds of thousands of miles away from our planet caused our son to have autism? Correct me if I’m wrong, but that seems to be the impression that I’m getting here.”

Emily sat down next to her husband just as close as her family doctor did to her shortly after their startling revelation earlier that day. She took his hands in hers, just like she did the day they got married some eleven years ago.

“Stephen, honey, I know how strange this must all sound to you, and believe me, since that time I really haven’t thought much about it. But somehow, this seems to go far beyond the realm of coincidence. I know, just by that look in your eyes, that you’re thinking about having the men in white coats come and lock me up, but you just have to listen to what I am saying here, and please do so with an open mind. I’m not necessarily asking you to believe it, just listen with what did the doctor talked about today, with kaleidoscope glasses on.”

“Geez, Em, I really am, but what you’re suggesting, it’s just, well, beyond me,” Stephen said, now getting up to take a drink from his cream soda that was nearby. “I mean, we have a serious problem now on our hands, and you want to talk about comets?”

“Damn it, Stephen, you don’t think I know how serious this is?” Emily shouted, her freckles now starting to appear in sharp relief on her cheeks again. “We’ve just been told today our son has some disease, I mean disorder, or whatever, and I’m trying to share something very important that I just think may be related to all of this.”

For the second time that day, Stephen’s wife began to cry with fresh rivulets of tears coming down her face.

“Do you know how hard it is knowing that I may not be able to talk with my own son ever again? Have you tried hugging him recently? I get more warmth and feeling from hugging my ironing board in the morning. And his eyes, Stephen, his eyes! It’s like staring into a deep well with nothing staring back. Remember how when he was first born and there was that sparkle of life there. Not there’s absolutely nothing!”

Emily was starting to shout now, oblivious of the fact that her children had just gone to bed only a half hour ago.

“And do you want to know what the worst part of this all is, being a mother. I really feel like my boy, our Brandon, has been stolen right from under our noses, like some freaking thief in the night just came in and replaced him with an imposter. You know what, I probably would have felt a little better today if the doctor had told me it was something we had done to cause this, but now we’re left with nothing but a bunch of questions and a son who barely acknowledges his own parents.”

“Em, I really think you’re over—” Stephen started to say, but before he could go on, his wife interrupted him again, now barely able to speak she was crying so hard.

“No, don’t interrupt me! Not now! Can’t you see I just what my son back! I just want to hold him again and sing to him like I used to, but I can’t do that now for fear of him freaking out on us or not even being aware of what’s going on around him.”

Stephen took his wife in his arms and directed them both over to the couch where he sat stroking her hair. She was still crying and attempting to say something, but since her face was now semi-buried in his chest he wasn’t quite sure what it was. All he could make out was a very muffled, “I just want my son back, I just want my son back…”

The two of them stayed that way for sometime before finally heading off to bed themselves.

Several weeks later, on an early Tuesday morning after Stephen had gone to work and Mike and Jacob had gone to school, Emily was busy finishing the last of the morning dishes when she thought she heard something akin to radio static. The fact that she heard it was not as unsettling as the fact that it was coming from the playroom where there was no radio. In fact, the only radio in the house was upstairs in their attic which had pretty much gone the way of the dodo bird ever since she had gotten her new MP3 player for Christmas last year.

Curious as to what could be making such an obsolete sound, she made her way to the playroom where its sole occupant these days was busily arranging an old set of Stephen’s Tinker Toys that had somehow survived his own childhood into some gargantuan structure nearly a foot taller than he was. If Emily had known of the ancient Colossus of Rhodes, she would have instantly recognized it for what it was, but the connection this time around was lost.

As she made her way into the playroom, the static increased in intensity until by the time she sat down next to her son it was almost impossible to think. She felt like she could have heard a butterfly flap its wings next to a roaring ocean much easier than the barrage of sound that was now cascading down around her brain.

“Brandon, sweetie, what are you making there?”

No response. Just more decisive moves on Brandon’s part to his chef-d'oeuvre.

“Brandon, won’t you even just look at me for a moment? Please?”

Still no response.

“Brandon, Mommy would be just so happy right now if you would just come over and give her a hug. Could you do that for me, please?”

No sounds except for the deafening roar of the static.

A single tear slid down her cheek, and Emily was just about ready to leave when she told herself, No, I can beat this, I know I can.

She went over to her son, still diligently working on an exact replica of some ancient Greek statue that had disappeared millennia ago and long before Christ himself walked this planet, and took her son in his arms.

Just as she anticipated, he began to wriggle and squirm as if avoiding getting his first tetanus shot, but she dug her proverbial heels in and squeezed only tighter.

“We can beat this thing, honey, if you’ll just let me,” she said, not really aware of what she was saying or if she really believed it.

Brandon’s squirming was now reaching a fever pitch and she had to use all of her strength now to hold on to him.

“Why won’t you let me love you, Brandon?” she was now shouting through tears and the raging static.

No response except for the constant wriggling attempt to escape.

“Come on, sweetie, just show me you love Momma!”

No response.

“Love me, damn it!”

Finally, Brandon bucked backwards like some bull attempting to lose its determined rider. His head struck Emily square in her mouth, and her lower lip started to gush a bright red trickle of blood all over both of them as Brandon’s own legs kicked forward, shattering his creation in a mock recreation of what happened to his source material of inspiration.

She quickly cupped her mouth to help quench the bleeding from drenching the playroom carpet and ran as fast she could to the adjoining bathroom. She grabbed the hand towel off the rack, not really caring at the moment that it was rich cream color or that they were a cheap wedding gift from Stephen’s uncle and aunt who were both laid off at the time.

As she applied the towel to her mouth, it quickly started to make flowery red prints as it soaked up the last of her blood oozing from her lower lip. Her back hit the back of the bathroom wall, where she sank down against it and started to bitterly cry like she did when she was three years old and her parents had told her her first pet had just been killed by an errant driver.

Never before in her life had she felt more like a failure, and as she lay there on her bathroom floor, still softly weeping and wondering just what the hell she was going to do next, she realized she could still hear the static that had first drawn her there, but now only very quietly now, as if she were listening to the Pacific surf from several miles away.

And, even quieter still, just beyond the realm of hearing, she could swear that she heard her son’s voice, lightly calling to her. She couldn’t quite make out what it said, but it sounded like he was apologizing to her.

She quickly dismissed such a silly notion, despite her attempts to persuade her husband not too long ago that the discovery of their son’s disorder was somehow tied to a celestial event over five years ago, and put her head on the floor, wishing more than ever that she could just go to sleep and when she woke up and everything would be back to normal.

A week later, she got her wish. Sort of.

It was nearly three in the afternoon and Bridgeport was just getting their first real shroud of snow for the season. Emily was lying on her living room sofa reading a book recommended by her neurologist about a woman named Temple Grandin who he said might offer some insight into to just how Brandon’s world operates, when she could swear she heard that same staticky sound that led to her not-so-pleasant encounter with her son just over a week ago. In fact, her lower lip, while not nearly as puffy as it was, was still a little sensitive to the touch, and served as a painful reminder whenever Stephen attempted to kiss her. In fact, she had practically begun to dismiss the whole “voices” thing to as just another figment of her wishful imagination.

Nonetheless, she put down her book and slowly walked over to the playroom and peered inside. Brandon had now moved on to the wonderful world of Legos and was now building something she actually recognized. A couple of weeks ago, she and her husband had caught a special on the History Channel discussing ancient constructions and she was now damned if she didn’t see her youngest child now constructing what was previously known as the Temple of Artemis right in her own house. However, the show had not come on until after ten o’clock, way after all of her children would have been in bed, so how on Earth could this be possible?

Emily, in her pondering of her son’s amazing architectural accomplishment, failed to realize that as she stood there in the doorway to the playroom that, unlike last time, instead of the radio static growing louder, it actually had softened to a very mild roar, the kind one hears filtering through their own ears when a not a sound is to be heard in a lifeless house.

When she heard her son’s voice, she nearly fainted in shock. And it wasn’t just from hearing it. It was because, while she clearly watched him continue to assemble the Legos with lightning-quick speed, she saw that his mouth was closed the entire time. And the voice didn’t come across the room through the air in the oscillations that it usually makes.

No, this one was clearly heard with crystalline quality in the last place she ever expected it.

In her mind.

“Hello, Mommy.”

She wasn’t quite sure how she knew how to do this, but with all the intuition a mother could muster, she thought her reply back to her son.

“B-brandon, is that y-you?” she said, hardly believing it was possible to stammer in one’s own thoughts.

“Yes, Mommy, it’s me. And you were right. About the comet.”

“I was?”

“Yes, and about lots of other things, too.”

Brandon kept on mobilizing Lego after Lego as if the only thing that mattered in this world was the assembly of this long-forgotten ancient construction.

“I’m sorry, Mommy, if I hurt you. I didn’t mean to, really. I just can’t help myself sometimes.”

Emily somehow found the strength to move her body closer to her son until she was standing right beside him as he stacked his creation ever higher. She was careful not to stand too close as, for the umpteenth time in so many weeks, she was crying again and did not want to taint her son’s microcosmos with his mother’s tears.

“That’s okay, baby. I think I understand now.”

“Oh, there’s just one more thing.”

“What’s that, sweetie?” she asked, wiping her face clean.

“If you want to hug me now, that’s okay. I won’t mind.”

At those words, Emily sank to her knees beside her son and grasped him in her arms.

True to his word, he did not squirm or wiggle or attempt to break free, and while he didn’t exactly reciprocate the affection being given, Emily didn’t really care. As far as she was concerned, she had her son back in her life again.

And to her, that was all that mattered.

Read more of Jeffrey's work at: Artists and Autism

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