Chapter 13
Three young women, dressed in black
tights, puckered their ruby-red-lipstick lips while
they sang tunes from the thirties and tap-danced on
a plywood plank set in the middle of the sidewalk.
Across the street, where Seventh Avenue meets West
Fourth Street, a sixty-year-old woman sang opera without
the benefit of accompaniment. Street vendors hawked
"no-nuke" T-shirts, leather belts and African
bead necklaces. A couple, complete with green knee
guards and headbands, roller-skated around the strollers,
expertly avoiding body contact.
Francisca and Roby kept turning their
heads, distracted and delighted by the intense activity.
They gaped wide-eyed, like infants, at the circus
of humanity around them. This marked our fourth stop
in a walking excursion through lower Manhattan. Not
only did Suzi and I want to share the city with them,
we wanted to expose them to other experiences away
from the workroom and the house on Thelma Street.
This departure from the schedule had the same value
and significance as any other ingredient in Robertito's
program. We did not want to over-orchestrate their
lives; we wanted to love them by helping them understand
the importance of their whole universe as a connected
circuit, that caring for themselves was a direct and
vital way of caring for their son.
We introduced Francisca and Roby
to "dun-tahs" in Chinatown, to smooth cappuccinos
in Little Italy and to avocado-tofu salads in Soho.
After we completed our stroll through the Village,
we hailed a taxi to the Whitney Museum on Madison.
In the lobby, Francisca bumped into
a guard and quickly excused herself. The man's stone-like
disinterest startled her. Francisca stared at him,
squinting her eyes and rubbing the back of her head.
"Hey, Bears, what's wrong with
him?" she said, speaking very slowly.
"Perhaps, he's sleepy,"
I responded simplistically, confined by my limited
Spanish vocabulary.
"No, Bears," she insisted.
"Look, he doesn't move."
Suzi and I trudged over to the officer,
who stood sentry in front of a locked door.
"Francisca, at least he breathes,"
I assured her.
Roby hid his smirk from his wife.
Francisca inched closer. Her eyes scrutinized the
man's chest. At that moment, a number of people joined
her to inspect the guard. They pointed to his mustache,
his eyelids and the shadow of stubble just visible
on his chin. He held his position in total disregard
of the observers. His downcast eyes avoided any direct
confrontation. Suddenly, Francisca burst out laughing
and hugged her husband in embarrassment. She had been
duped by a piece of sculpture, one of many on display
in the museum which presented the uncanny illusion
of actual biological life.
Our arrival at the Lincoln Center
for the Performing Arts highlighted the day. A friend
had given me courtesy tickets to the American Ballet
Theater's performance of Swan Lake at the Metropolitan
Opera House. The complex buildings, with their facades
of glass, aluminum and marble, hypnotized the Sotos.
Roby gaped at the patterns of floating people visible
through three stories of windows as they glided between
floors on silver escalators.
Francisca put her hand over her mouth
as we entered the opera house. Her eyes could barely
absorb the beauty of the endless rows of chandeliers
which dotted the interior of the theater. Roby's mouth
dropped open unconsciously as he observed the collage
of humanity, people draped in tuxedos and gowns standing
beside others in jeans and worn overalls.
Even as we were ushered to our seats,
Roby stretched his neck to view the various balconies
which ringed the huge hall. Francisca stared at the
diamond-like formation of lights suspended from the
ceiling.
The overture filled the darkness.
Suzi pulled herself close to me. Francisca and Roby
focused on the curtains, waiting to see their first
ballet.
"I'm so happy for them,"
Suzi whispered. We both watched our dear friends,
silently sharing their involvement. Panic no longer
quivered by their lips. Their son and their situation
had become more comprehensible and joyful to them.
In their search to touch Robertito, they had begun
to touch themselves.
The music swept through the audience
like waves of warm water. I had always felt a certain
aloofness to ballet. This night, the choreographed
allegory swept me beyond the confines of my seat.
Maybe the presence of Roby and Francisca had made
a difference. Maybe I had opened another doorway and
made myself more available to the experience. The
dancers' world became my world. Their story became
the only story. A complete absorption. The stage floor
began to ripple like the surface of a small lake.
Had my retina and mind conspired to give me the illusion
and added depth of an actual Swan Lake? I closed my
eyes and reopened them only to discover the water
on the black floor had become even more vivid, I turned
away, then looked back. Occasional ripples fluttered
beneath the dancer's feet. I closed my eyes once more.
"Anything wrong?" Suzi
said in a hushed voice.
"Just experimenting," I
said nonchalantly. She smiled at me in the same motherly
way she smiled at Raun. Suzi locked her arm tightly
around mine and gave her full attention back to the
ballet.
The darkness became heavy like thick
pea soup. The music and moving figures retreated into
the dense fog as my awareness focused solely on the
floor of the stage. I did not see water the way I
saw the chair or the walls in the theater. I sensed
the water so vividly that I experienced its presence
without seeing it. No vision. No three-dimensional
hallucination. Only the lingering knowledge of water
... more dominant in my mind than all the activity
in the theater. I negotiated with myself to accept
this peculiar distraction.
In the midst of my internal dialogue,
I felt the presence of someone else on the stage,
someone who did not belong. I strained my eyes, searching
among the dancers. Then, in center stage, away from
the activity of the plot which the performers enacted
on the left portion of the stage, I sensed the form
of a small boy. He was there, yet I knew he was not
there. My eyes riveted on his illusive form, too small
and too vague to identify. Who was he? What was he
doing on stage? No, not on stage ... what was he doing
in my mind? The ripples marred the flat surface of
the dance floor again. The child began to sink...
to drown. His arms grabbed wildly for some support.
Even as the applause filled the theater and the performers
took their bows, I saw only the trauma behind the
dancers. Francisca and Roby bubbled with their enthusiasm
to Suzi. I remained apart. Though the curtain had
fallen, my eyes still perceived the stage, the water
and the child, whose form continued to recede beneath
the threatening liquid. Then, like a shockwave, my
body became rigid in response to a voice, my own voice,
which screamed Raun's name somewhere deep inside.
"Wait here!" I said abruptly
to Suzi and I bolted from the seat. Adrenaline flooded
my arteries, throwing my nervous system into high
gear. Everything around me seemed to move in slow
motion. Pushing past the people promenading leisurely
up the aisle during intermission became a profoundly
difficult task, "Excuse me. Excuse me. Thanks.
Just let me pass, please; I have to pass," I
clamored, weaving through the murky chatter and bulky
bodies. Interlocked arms stretched across the entrance
to the lobby like a tight scrimmage line. The obstacle
course continued even as I approached the escalator
and the long column of people poised in front of it.
Turning away, I grabbed the railing of a staircase
and lunged downward. "Raun. Not Raun. Please,
not Raun," I cried breathlessly to myself. The
imagery of the stage floor propelled me across the
bottom step with such force that I lost my balance
in an attempt to avoid a young woman crossing my path.
I stumbled, using my hands against the floor to stabilize
my body. Eyes peered at me quizzically, curiously,
reflecting an ironic tolerance for my irregular behavior.
"Where are the phones?"
I asked an usher. Though he stood within two feet
of me, the time required for the sound of my voice
to reach him felt like a hundred years. His half-smile
slowly disappeared from his cheeks. His head dipped
in fractional movements, an instant replay energized
by fading batteries. I knew to watch his hand, which
rose lethargically from his side of his body to a
point over the heads of the other patrons. His index
finger aimed at a telephone sign on the other side
of the corridor. Before his words reached my ears,
my legs had lifted me off the carpet into a half-turn
and propelled me toward my destination.
An older man collided with me twenty
feet from the telephones. We exchanged quick apologies
and continued on our separate journeys. All the booths
were occupied. I waited two seconds, then tapped insistently
on the first window. "An emergency. It's an emergency,"
I said. The woman shook her finger at me like a scolding
mother. She smiled pleasantly, refusing to believe
me or separate from her call. The man in the next
booth claimed his call also ranked as an emergency.
At the window of the third booth,
I displayed a ten-dollar bill. "Ten bucks for
the phone this instant."
"Are you kidding, mister?"
the young man questioned suspiciously. Our eyes locked.
He belched a quick good-by into the receiver, shook
his head and departed without taking the money.
I rumbled through my pants' pocket.
When I jerked my hand free, a barrage of coins exploded
to all parts of the booth. Ten cents. Ten cents. I
grabbed the first dime and dumped it into the slot.
After depositing an additional twenty-five cents,
the line connected.
"Hello," Denise, our baby-sitter,
answered in a relaxed voice.
"This is Bears. Don't ask why
... just run upstairs right now and check Raun ...
then check the girls. Now. Hurry. Go." I heard
the phone receiver drop against the wall. The sweat
poured from my forehead. The wetness under my shirt
surfaced near my neck. C'mon, Denise, c'mon, I cheered
in my mind. Only the banging ear-piece against the
wall greeted my urgency. I kept breathing for Raun,
filling his lungs with oxygen. Where are you, Denise?
I could feel my pulse beat in my gums. Then, I heard
footsteps coming toward the other end of the phone.
My mind went absolutely blank as if everything I thought
or imagined had been completely erased.
"Bears," the breathless
voice began, "they're okay. Raun and Thea are
playing checkers. And Bryn's reading."
I moaned my release.
"What's going on?" Denise
asked. "You scared me half to death."
"I'm sorry," I said. "It's
such a strange story. I had this incredibly, ah, compelling
... feeling. I had to make sure Raun and the girls
were okay." I sighed. "Thanks, honey."
As I climbed the wide staircase to
the second floor, I felt light-headed. People had
begun to return to their seats for the next portion
of the performance. When I entered the theater, I
looked toward the stage. The curtain still appeared
transparent; the child still sinking in the water.
"Oh no," I groaned aloud. "It's not
Raun; it's Robertito. Oh, God, it's Robertito."
I turned in my tracks and raced across the second
floor lobby, jumped down the stairs and ran for the
phones again.
I dialed the Sotos' number quickly
and got a busy signal. I re-dialed it and re-dialed
it and re-dialed it. How could Charlotte be on the
phone when she was supposed to be working with Robertito?
After twenty additional attempts, I thought of Laura,
who lived nearby.
"Hiya," the voice bellowed
into the receiver playfully.
"Rha," I said.
"Hiya, Bears," she replied,
instantly recognizing my voice.
"I hate to ask you, but you're
the only one who can help."
"Sure, what is it?" Laura
said with concern.
"Right now, go over to the Soto
house. I cast get through. The phone's busy. Just
go there and check everything for me. Okay? Could
you do that right now?"
"Yeah, yeah," she said.
"You have to go straight there,
okay? No stops. Just straight there. I'll explain
everything later. Listen, I may not sound coherent,
but I am."
Laura hung up the receiver, ran down
the stairs and jumped into her Volkswagen. She drove
the bug across part of her lawn and bounced over the
curb into the street. The urgency disturbed her. A
line-up of cars stalled traffic for almost half a
mile. Steering her car on the gravel, she whizzed
past the log jam, then re-entered the road. Nervousness
merged with embarrassment. She felt uncomfortable
intruding on Charlotte, checking on her like a nursemaid.
But her fleeting self-consciousness disappeared when
she thought about her little enigmatic Mexican friend.
The lock yielded easily to the turn
of her key. Laura whistled loudly as she entered.
"Charlotte," she called.
"Who's there?" came the
reply.
"It's me. Rha. I, uh, left my
box of saxophone reeds here. I'm just going to look
for it." Laura paused, counted to three and said:
"Everything okay?"
"Honky-dory," Charlotte
sang.
Relieved, Laura began her mock-search
in the living room and kitchen. Several seconds later,
Charlotte, her hair half-set in curlers, bounced down
the stairs.
"I'll help," she said.
"It's one of the blue boxes, right?"
Laura nodded sheepishly. "How's
it going?" she asked, intending to inquire about
Charlotte's session with Robertito.
"Tomorrow morning Brad's taking
me to breakfast. Isn't that neat?" she bubbled.
"And Sunday night, it's time for other friend."
"You must mean Nick," Laura
said. Charlotte winked. Then, as Laura lifted the
pillow from the couch, she realized the ramifications
of Charlotte's presence. We had all agreed not to
break a session unless there was an emergency. Certainly
her fictitious box of lost reeds did not qualify as
an emergency.
"Where's Robertito?" Laura
asked.
"Upstairs," Charlotte chimed.
"Maybe you'd better get back
up, okay?" Laura counseled.
Charlotte smiled. "No rush.
He was real hyper tonight, so I stuck him in a bath."
Laura whipped around. "A bath!
Is he in the bath now?" Charlotte nodded casually.
"Jesus," Laura mumbled, pushing past the
other woman and running up the stairs.
"What's the big deal?"
Charlotte called, shaking her head as she followed.
Frightened by her own imagination,
Laura fought an impulse to scream. How long had they
been downstairs together? Two minutes? Three? Was
that enough time for a life to be extinguished? Laura
tripped up the stairs and charged into the bathroom.
"Robertito," she hollered, catching her
first glimpse of the little boy slouched in the corner
of the tub. The water level covered his chin completely
and rippled around his lips. He babbled incessantly
as his face and hands quivered in the cool water.
As she reached for him, he began to sink beneath the
water. She grabbed him under his arms and pulled him
out. The shiver in her own body mirrored his. Laura
hugged his nude, wet form. "It's okay, Tito.
You're okay now." A tenderness oozed from her
body as she tightened her embrace. She thanked the
universe for his life. The dam had burst. She knew
she loved him with the same intensity as she loved
Raun. Laura felt protective, involved, soft and distinctly
feminine. In experiencing her caring for Robertito,
she knew clearly, for the first time, that she could
love any child and every child.
"See, he's fine!" Charlotte
grinned as she casually entered the room.
"What the hell's the matter
with you? He's not fine. He's shaking," Laura
barked, surprised at her own voice, as she wrapped
him in a towel. "The damn water is freezing."
She paused and inhaled deeply. "Do you realize
how dangerous it is to leave him alone, especially
in water? He doesn't have the same responses we do.
He could have slid under and drowned."
"Oh, c'mon," Charlotte
said, now visibly uncomfortable. "He'd be okay."
"How do you know?" Laura
shouted. "He's not an Olympic swimmer or even
a normal six-year-old. He can't take care of himself.
Besides, Charlotte, you're supposed to be working
with him." The insistent ringing of the phone
intruded. As Charlotte went downstairs to answer it,
Laura gaped at the other woman. "Wait,"
she ordered. "I'll get it." Still holding
the little boy, she went downstairs and picked up
the receiver.
"Hello, Rha ... is that you?"
I asked.
"Oh, Bears, thank God for your
strange feelings," Laura said.
"Is he okay?" I asked,
having dialed the number over one hundred times before
getting through.
"Yes. I'll call you later when
you get home," she said. "I'm going to help
put him to sleep." Laura hung up the phone and
stared at Robertito's trembling lips. He seemed disoriented
and lost. His gentle expression matched by his extreme
vulnerability overwhelmed her. When she returned to
the bathroom, she noticed the hair blower and curlers
on the sink. Obviously, with Robertito immersed in
the water, Charlotte had decided to set her hair and
then apparently abandoned the little boy to go downstairs.
In utter disbelief, Laura avoided looking directly
at the other woman. She gently wiped the child's body
while he flapped with one hand and said: "Eee-o,
eee-o."
"I'll do that," Charlotte
declared, toweling his back. "I mean you don't
have to be so upset," she said, noticing the
tension in Laura's face. "Nothing happened. After
all, nothing happened."
Our telephone rang at five in the
morning. Laura, relieved and irrevocably changed by
the previous night's incident, described in detail
her experience with Charlotte. Suzi and I listened
intently, trying to extract the lesson from what had
occurred.
As we drove to the Soto house the
following day, I turned to Suzi, "I know Francisca
has known for a long time that Charlotte doesn't belong
here. She's been taking care of her fears, not her
wants. If she had trusted herself, last night would
not have occurred."
"Maybe once she and Roby know
about it, they'll decide differently."
"'I'm not sure I want to tell
them."
"What?" Suzi exclaimed.
"Why not?"
"It's important to get Francisca
and Roby out of the house once in a while. They have
never let that child out of their sight in almost
six years. Now, tell them this, and they'll be cemented
to him."
When we arrived, Laura had begun
her session with Robertito. Roby and Francisca sat
at the kitchen table with an unmistakable expression
of excitement and fatigue.
"We want to tell you something,"
Francisca announced, talking in a simplified Spanish.
"Come. Sit. Coffee? Tea?" After serving
us, she continued. "After you dropped us off
last night..."
Roby touched his wife's shoulder.
"We want you both to know how grateful we are
for everything. We will always remember yesterday.
For Robertito, there are no words."
Had Laura told them despite my suggestion
to shelve the incident for the moment?
"All aspects of yesterday were
important," I said.
"Leaving Robertito for a day,"
Suzi interjected, "gave you an opportunity to
return and see with different eyes."
"In many ways, that's true,"
Roby concurred. "Mommy, you tell them."
"Roby and I talked till four
in the morning," she said proudly. "We did,
well, sort of an Option session. We asked each other
questions like you do, Bears. We discussed the past
weeks with Charlotte. I see my own anger and blindness
now. So we have decided to ask her to leave, today,
this morning. We are not angry with her. We think
it would be best for our son and for her. She's not
happy here." Francisca leaned over and hugged
her husband. Suzi and I glanced at each other in awe.
Laura, in fact, had not spoken to them about the previous
night.
"Maybe, one day, Bears, I will
teach Option to Spanish people," Roby added.
"Charlotte goes," Francisca
reasserted without malice. She and Roby nodded,
"Okay," I said. "Suzi
and I will try to locate another interpreter for tomorrow
night. We'll try. We'll see." I smiled and touched
their hands. "If we don't get one, we'll just
keep talking to each other until everyone understands."
We need the fluency and the exacting details of language
an interpreter could provide, especially during our
Wednesday night meetings.
When we left, I turned to Suzi. "Hey,
sweet lady, how come you didn't tell them?"
"It didn't seem necessary, at
least not now," she replied. "They explored
the problem and found their own answer without even
knowing about last night. That's really exciting.
Really."
Though Francisca and Roby offered
Charlotte the opportunity to continue living with
them until she found another job or decided to return
home, she departed immediately.
Rita, a gatherer of talented and
caring volunteers, filled the translator spot within
hours. She introduced Amalia, a gentle and elegant
woman who had fled Europe with her family before the
onset of the Second World War. Unable to obtain visas
to enter the United States, they lived for years in
Cuba. Amalia's general ease with Spanish and her familiarity
with our approach through one of Rita's therapy groups,
provided us with a woman who not only translated but
further enriched the group with her delicate caring
and affection.
The other gap resulting from Charlotte's
exit appeared more difficult to bridge. In the interim,
her sessions with Robertito had been distributed among
all of us. Suzi and I reviewed the recent letters
we received from the piles of hundreds mailed to us
each month. We had volunteers from San Diego, Chicago,
Des Moines, Portland, Washington, D.C., and countless
other cities. We separated those from people who lived
within the New York area. We reviewed notes from all
the recent telephone calls. And then, ignoring hours
of research, Suzi jumped to her feet and declared:
"I've got it, but it's not in any of these piles.
Remember that girl ... when you spoke at the college?"
"Which college?"
Suzi smiled. "Not only can't
I remember her name, but I don't recall the name of
the school either." She kissed me on the forehead.
"Don't go away. I'll find it."
Then, as I flipped through more letters,
I recalled one particular girl. I had been the guest
speaker at her college for a special conference. Following
the talk, she attached herself to both Suzi and me.
In twenty quick minutes, she flooded Suzi with intimate
details of her life story. She had read Son-Rise for
a course she had taken the previous semester. She
felt as if she had actually worked with Raun, touched
his hands, smiled his smiles. The familiarity of incidents
recorded on each page haunted her. A door had opened
and she refused to let go. Carol. That's it, I thought.
Her name is Carol.
"Here it is," Suzi boasted.
"Your Suzi found it."
I put my index finger to the center
of my forehead like a fortune-teller. "The person
is Carol."
"Hey, that's not fair,"
Suzi clamored, putting on her sad clown face. "Ah-hah,"
she beamed. "What you might not know is that
the person called me several times since your talk.
A super-persistent lady."
"Feels right," I concluded.
"You know how people always ask how we decide
who to work with. Somehow the most persistent person
gives you the clearest message. Well, let's get this
Carol person over here."
She entered our home rather formally
attired in a skirt and low heels. Carol's long hair
covered half her back. Her sharp features, the square
chin, the cleft, the dark blue eyes, accented a definite
determination. When I hugged her, she stiffened without
returning the greeting. Nevertheless, her nervousness
did not abort her warmth and intensity.
"I can't tell you what this
means to me," Carol said. "I want to learn
to work with people the way you do. Here," she
declared, showing us a Spanish-English dictionary.
"I've already started learning Spanish. I have
two other texts and a third on order."
Carol Bell had left college and worked
in a bank unhappily for five years full time. When
she returned to her studies in order to major in special
education, she developed a ferocious appetite to learn.
Carol was not just another person completing the expected
routine from crib to college. She cared about school
with an abiding passion. Every course and every text
meant something special ... an alternative, an opportunity.
We explained the elements of Robertito's
program and the importance of the attitude and our
own personal happiness. Her head bobbed up and down
excitedly. I purposely described the less attractive
details. I gave her a blunt commentary on the experience
of changing the diaper of an old boy nearing his sixth
birthday. I talked about his possible lack of response
for hours ... for days. No matter what I presented,
how oddly or graphically I portrayed it, Carol kept
her head moving. "Yes, yes," she whispered
many times. "If you told me I'd have to assist
in open-heart surgery, I'd do it," she insisted.
Her power and her directness supported
her intentions. Only her frequent tendency to speak
in a monotone voice and her lack of facial expressiveness
concerned me. Carol withheld portions of herself.
"One of the most important things
with Robertito is expressiveness," Suzi said,
mind-reading again. "We really cheer him and
smile and laugh and kiss him. I mean like this."
Suzi shouted, cheered and applauded an imaginary friend
beside her. Then she pantomimed an embrace and finished
the monologue with a deep laugh.
Carol smiled easily for the first
time. "I'm just a little nervous... but with
a kid, it's different. I can do that. I'll be fine."
"Can you start observing right
away?" I asked. "I mean like today, this
afternoon." She indicated her affirmation with
a slight tilt of her head.
Suzi kissed her, though Carol resisted.
"I'm glad you're with us," she said. "And
one thing we're going to work on is your hug."
Carol turned red. "Hey, there's nothing to be
embarrassed about. Most of us were taught to hide
behind walls all of our lives."
"If you don't want to be hugged,
that's not a prerequisite," I added, "That's
just the way we tell each other we care." I paused
and peered at her eager face. "I think everybody
wants to be hugged ... including you."
Carol allowed a tiny grin to crease
her face. "There's something else you should
know. Maybe it will affect your decision." She
stared at the table for several seconds, bit her lip,
then blurted: "I'm an epileptic."
"And I'm six feet three inches
tall," I volunteered.
A second full smile flooded her face.
Carol initiated the hugs this time. Though her body
felt tight and her eyelids quivered, she grabbed each
of us strongly. "I'll be back at two," she
promised, and left.
Carol lingered in the car outside
the house for over ten minutes. She did not want to
break the spell. Her thoughts drifted inevitably to
her father, who had died just after her fifteenth
birthday. She did not just remember him; she pulled
his presence close to her, back across ten years of
time. The memory of his frail and withered form during
those last two years receded against the more powerful
image of a younger man. The beautiful eyes. The solid,
firm body, The strong facial features. The handsome
cleft in his chin, which she, too, had inherited.
"Frank would approve," she thought, mouthing
her father's first name as she turned the ignition
and heard his words. "It's beautiful for a man
to cry."
Instead of going home, Carol drove
to her favorite spot, a narrow, rocky jetty which
extended out into the Atlantic. She jumped from boulder
to boulder until she arrived at the spot where the
ocean dove between and under the rocks. A calmness
swept through her.
If Robertito, like Raun, can get
better, she thought, then maybe I can. Carol knew
she had no logical reason to make such a connection,
but she did. Her neurologist, aware of her interview
with us, asked her with mild sarcasm why she would
choose to work with an autistic child ... had she
expected to cure the incurable? That very word had
also been applied to her illness. Incurable! Robertito
had to get better, he had to! She placed the first
hope she dared to have for herself in the journey
of a little boy she had not yet met.
Carol returned in the afternoon and
met Francisca, Roby and Laura. I scheduled a dialogue
session for her later in the week. Carol would begin
with Carol, exploring her own unhappiness, beliefs
and judgments. Observing others would lead to tandem
teaching. Finally, when she assessed herself as ready,
she would begin solo sessions with our young friend.
We discussed these components as Suzi worked with
Robertito upstairs.
The little boy grabbed Suzi's hand
and placed it in front of her face. They twirled their
fingers in front of their eyes simultaneously.
"Can you touch your nose, Robertito?"
she asked. "Touch your nose."
Very slowly, he stopped his "ism"
and tapped the palm of his hand to the tip of his
nose.
"Fantastico," Suzi shouted,
lavishing him with hugs and kisses. When his body
stiffened, she moved away. She had him locate the
other features of his face. He pointed to each one,
but seemed confused about the location of his ears.
Intermittently, Suzi fed him small portions of food.
They worked with a puzzle together,
then the pegboard, then the insertion box. She tried
again to teach him how to roll a ball. He pushed it
awkwardly with the front of his hand, the back of
his hand and his wrist. When he paced in a circle,
Suzi followed him, babbling as he babbled. Then, experimenting,
she turned around and went in the opposite direction.
To her surprise, Robertito stopped, side-glanced at
her and finally turned around and followed her. She
laughed and sang her support as she led the activity.
Later, Robertito sat by himself in
the middle of the room while Suzi massaged his hands.
Instead of his traditional "eee-o" or "boy-o,"
Suzi heard a different combination of sounds. "Ca-a-o,"
he said. "Ca-a-o. Ca-a-o." He slurred the
letters into each other, but Suzi tried to decipher
them. Then it struck her. "It can't be,"
she blurted in English.
"Caballo? Is that what you're
saying?" she said. "Caballo." Without
delay, she assumed the horseback-ride position. Robertito
flopped immediately onto her back. She made some appropriate
sounds and then crawled around the room with her rider.
"Caballo," she repeated every couple of
seconds. Roby had often used the word horse to describe
the rides he gave his son. As she worked with him,
hitting the xylophone, he mumbled those same letters
again. Suzi called to Francisca to listen. For the
next hour Robertito remained characteristically mute.
Only the babbling and cooing broke the silence.
Carol replaced Francisca on the sidelines
and watched the continuing session. When the little
boy held Suzi's thighs and danced with her, Carol
fought back the tears which filled her eyes. She turned
away to hide her face, but changed her mind, allowing
more of who she was to penetrate the outer walls;
for she, too, felt the same comfort and security in
the room that she imagined this wonderful, alluring
child felt.
After Carol's departure, I returned
home to pick up both Thea and Raun for their sessions
with Robertito. "I've been thinking," Raun
said in the truck. "Robertito is going to get
bigger than me faster than he's going to get older
than me. That's because he can't have a birthday every
day, but he sure can eat every day."
Oh, Raunchy," Thea giggled,
patting her brother on the head.
At the Soto house, Roby played catch
with Raun while Thea taught in tandem with her mother.
They ran and jumped and danced together. Though Thea
was three years older than Robertito, her thin and
delicate figure appeared miniaturized against his
soft yet solid hulk. She laughed in a tiny, high voice
each time he imitated her, although the majority of
the action followed his lead. Thea tried to teach
Robertito how to sniff with his nose, scratching the
indicated areas of a "Smell" book filled
with the scents of chocolate, rose, banana, lilac,
lemon and orange.
Suzi and I accompanied Raun during
his portion of the session. The four of us clapped
and rocked together. Then we presented Raun with his
first opportunity to feed Robertito.
"Really? Can I?" He shook
the upper portion of his torso in delight. With the
expertise of a seasoned teacher, he delivered spoonful
after spoonful. He stroked his friend gently under
the chin as he chewed. After the meal, Robertito kept
touching Raun. At one point, feeling the larger boy's
pressure, Raun faked a fall and whispered: "I
did it so Robertito would feel strong."
Our little friend did his whole repertoire
of "isms." He watched Raun carefully from
the corner of his eye in order to, perhaps, monitor
Raun's responses. Sometimes, Robertito peered directly
into our son's face, but only for seconds at a time.
When Robertito rolled on the floor, Raun followed.
Then Raun put his arm around his friend, spontaneously
expressing his affection. To our surprise, Robertito
responded in kind by placing his arm limply on Raun's
shoulder. When Suzi asked "Where's Raun?"
the child pointed to our son. We clapped and shouted
our excitement. Robertito smiled at the wall. I turned
the music on and guided the two children in a dance
together. With their arms around each other, they
rocked in a simple side-to-side two-step. Finally,
Robertito broke away and began to increase his focus
on his self-stimulating rituals.
"Go ahead, Raunchy, sit in front
of him in the exact position he's in," I counseled.
"Okay," he replied, half-skipping
across the room and assuming the same Buddha-like
pose as his friend. Robertito hand-flapped. Our son
stared at him curiously.
"You remember, sweet boy, do
what he does," Suzi said.
Raun flapped his hand in perfect
cadence. Robertito stopped abruptly. Raun stopped.
Robertito turned his head and faced his young mentor.
Very purposefully, he stared directly into Raun's
eyes. Our son smiled several times. Four seconds became
ten seconds. Robertito did not turn away. Twenty incredible
seconds had elapsed with their eyes locked together.
Astounded, I clocked the first half a minute of sustained,
direct eye contact Robertito had ever bestowed on
anyone without interruption. Suzi and I held our breath.
We dared not move. We had never seen Robertito do
this before. Never!
As the two boys explored each other
visually, Raun angled his head toward us. A huge,
old-man smile embraced his face. In a soft and rich
voice, Raun said: "We're telling the truth to
each other ... we do it with our eyes."
Chapter
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