The Meridians(21)

So all through that first Christmas, Kevin Army Crawled everywhere. He Army Crawled through the rooms, he Army Crawled around the table where Robbie and Lynette had put their tree (high enough that their son could not possibly get to it and pull it over on himself), and he even Army Crawled through every one of the boxes that his Christmas presents had come in - while neglecting the toys themselves. It was wonderful, and Robbie had allowed himself to think that the worst was over; that things were going to go well for them from then on.

That was the first Christmas, however. This Christmas - Kevin's second Christmas - was different. This Christmas was not spent nearly so much in paper and ribbon and stockings and Army Crawling as it was spent in tests and hospitals and anxiety.

It started early, shortly after Kevin's first birthday. He started crying again, rolling jags of weeping that reminded Robbie and Lynette of his first few months, when all he did was cry and sleep. And no matter what, they could not find a way to comfort him. Not even a good horror movie on his daddy's lap was enough to console whatever angst was hiding in his young heart.

The crying happened day and night, for no apparent reason. One moment he would be watching Sesame Street or Teletubbies happily, the next he would be screaming. One moment he would be eating his dinner quietly, shoving mashed potatoes into his mouth - and hair and nose and belly button as though he was determined to become the first human to perfect the process of osmosis - and the next he would be curled up on his high chair, crying so hard that it was only the small seatbelt that kept him from falling to the tile floor of the kitchen. One moment he would be holding his mother, the next he would be shrieking and gnashing at her like a rabid dog.

The crying continued, and one day Lynette discovered that, rather than holding Kevin tightly to her, if she dangled him on her knee as far away from her as possible, he would quiet. He didn't want to be put completely down, but nor did he want to be cuddled. It was as though he hungered for human companionship, but could not stand the feel of another person's skin on his own.

Then, right about the time that they came up with this new way of caring for their unique (not strange, never strange or Lynette would draw and quarter him for saying such a thing) son, he began doing something more subtle but much more troubling than merely crying.

Robbie was the one who noticed it first. He was the designated peek-a-booer in the family. Lynette would do in a pinch, but she just didn't have the je ne sais quois to be more than a merely competent peek-a-boo partner. Robbie, however, was ready to turn in his amateur card and go on the professional circuit. He was a master of silly faces and sounds, of making his eyes blink in just the right way, of sticking out his tongue at just the right moment so that Kevin would collapse in laughter. Over and over they could play, with Robbie invariably being the one to tire of the exercise first.

But after a while he started noticing that Kevin's peek-a-boo game was off. Not that he wouldn't play; he was as game as ever to play. But when they did play, Kevin gradually changed his manner of playing. He would pull Robbie's hands apart like a pair of barn doors as he always had, but instead of looking at Robbie's newest funny face and laughing, he would look beyond Robbie. He would look through Robbie, as though he were examining Robbie's soul...and more than that, as though he were finding it wanting somehow. Nor would he laugh. Just open the hands, look through his father, then shove the hands back. What had been a joy for both of them became something more like a rote exercise.

When Robbie brought it up to Lynette, she immediately worried. The threat of mental handicap that Doctor Cody had mentioned over a year previously hung over every day of their lives, casting a light shadow that lent a dimness to even the brightest moments. But when they took Kevin to the pediatrician, a genial older man named Doctor Abernathy, the man had not been able to find much at all to be worried about.

Still, it troubled Robbie greatly, that his son no longer looked him in the eye. No longer looked at much of anything.

And then there were the cars.

For his first birthday, Robbie had given Kevin a package of ten wooden toy cars. Kevin had played with them relentlessly for a few days, then they somehow made their way to the corner of his room and were forgotten for more interesting toys. Until one day when Kevin was fourteen months old, and Robbie came home from work to the sound of wretched crying.

And it wasn't Kevin. It was Lynette. Robbie hurried to the back of the apartment, and found Lynette sitting next to Kevin, who was playing - rather nicely, Robbie thought - with the cars. Robbie actually smiled when he saw his son playing that way, and felt slightly irritated with Lynette for just sitting next to their son and crying her eyes out. Both of them had decided very early on that they would try not to yell or cry in front of Kevin, would instead try to shower him with happiness and positive feelings only.

"What's going on, Lynny?" he asked, and even as he did so his irritation tempered into concern and shame. Concern for Lynette, who was clearly devastated about something, and shame at his own first reaction. Why would I be angry when someone I love is crying? he thought. Why would I want to reprimand instead of comfort?

"It's Kevin," said Lynette between tears.

"What about him?"

"He's playing with the cars."

"So?" Robbie looked again at his son. He still didn't see anything amiss. "That's what we bought them for."

"But look at how he's playing with them," said Lynette.