Half a World Away (9 page)

Fast? Jaden watched as Kanat climbed back on his horse, the eagle on his glove. There was a forked post attached to the saddle, and Kanat rested his gloved arm in the fork. It had all gone so quickly, Jaden hadn't had time to process everything. What did Sam mean by “fast”? He didn't know what kind of power he might have gained, though the eagle was very impressive. Even so, he felt a pang of sadness for the bloody hare.

“It's sad for the hare,” Jaden said.

“Yes, sure,” Kanat answered. “A hare is very wonderful. I have much respect for prey.” He became sorrowful momentarily, and then the pride filled his face again. “Often you don't catch something so soon. Sometimes it takes many hours. But she wanted to put on show for you. She is not as quick as some eagles, and many times she cannot catch hares because a hare has much of speed.”

“How come you use a girl eagle?” Jaden asked.

“The females are bigger and perhaps braver. She once took down a wolf. Many do not believe she did this, but it is true. Kanat is best eagle I ever knew.”

The eagle was sitting peacefully on Kanat's gloved arm. Jaden stepped closer and then closer until he was right next to her. Her feet were as long as his own feet. “The talons are very strong,” Kanat said. “The beak as well.”

“Come now, Jaden,” said Sam. “I will get you back to your parents. Maybe you will have time to see your friend at baby house. I did not know things would go so well. I am very pleased.”

They rode back to Kanat's house, but this time Jaden didn't feel like he was meditating. It was hard to meditate when you've just seen a giant bird swooping through the sky. It made him feel kind of wired, then sad for the hare, then wired again. They arrived at the yurt before Kanat. Jaden got up, closed his eyes, and concentrated. But he didn't feel more powerful. “I don't feel any extra power,” he said.

“Maybe you will feel it, and maybe you will not. But it will be inside you, I promise you this.”

When Kanat got home, he placed the hooded eagle on the perch in an outside enclosure. “The hood keeps them calm,” Kanat said.

What would it be like for such a bird to be cooped up all day? “Is she happy?” Jaden asked.

“Happy!” Kanat said. “It is my usefulness to see to it that she is happy!” To Sam, he said, “You will come in for drink? I have vodka.”

Sam looked tempted, but then his face fell. “I have promised my wife I would never drink when I must drive, and I do not like to lie to my wife. But next time I will stay all day. Save your vodka for me.”

“Sure, sure,” Kanat said.

“Thank you,” Jaden said. “Great eagle.”

“Sure, sure.”

Jaden got into the car with Sam. As he started the car, Sam said, “Do not lie to your wife. Even if she does not find out, you will be mistaken to lie to her. Listen to me—I am teaching you well, as I promised your mother.”

“I think she meant to teach me about eagles.”

“The eagle may teach you herself. It is my duty to teach you about your wife. This is one lesson of today.”

After that, Sam didn't talk for most of the way back, during which time he drove like a madman, as usual.

Then he asked, “Jaden, what have you thought your power will be?”

“I have no idea.”

“You will find something that makes you fly, and then your life will be settled. What is it you thought of the eagle?”

“I'm not sure. She was spectacular, I guess.”

“What is this?”

“Spectacular. It means amazing.”

“I have shown you an eagle's power, and you have taught me a new word. This is good,” Sam said. He held out a fist, and Jaden bumped it with his own.

Chapter Nineteen

T
hey reached the baby house during the last half hour of bonding time. Jaden felt like he'd been in a fantasy world all day, and now he was going back to reality. He felt a little dazed to be in the real world again. Dimash was across the courtyard by an old swing set. He spotted Jaden immediately and started crying out,
“Kak dyela! Kak dyela!”
Jaden stood, waiting and smiling. He enjoyed watching Dimash run toward him. As usual, the boy stopped himself by bumping right into Jaden's stomach, which immediately brought Jaden back to this world. He was surprised at the lift in his heart when he saw Dimash. He was a funny little guy. Full Kazakh, no doubt—he could not have looked more Central Asian. Beautiful, except you could tell he wasn't right. His way of running was awkward, and the way he stood, with one shoulder scrunched down, was strange. No, the future was not bright for Dimash if he didn't learn to walk differently. Walking was important.

Jaden knelt down in front of him. “Dimash, my man, you need to find the part of yourself inside that can save you.” That was what Dr. Wilder had said to him once. “What are your brains like in there? Can you save yourself?”

Dimash gazed at him intently, his shoulder scrunched, his stance geeky. Jaden pulled the boy's shoulder up until both sides were even. “Here, stand like this. Good! Now watch.” Jaden walked evenly, with a little bit of swagger. “That's how you walk. Come on, walk to me.”

Dimash pushed his shoulder down and walked to Jaden even geekier than usual.

“No,” Jaden said, patiently but firmly. “When you walk, you must be cool. Then maybe nobody will bother you. Believe me, I've seen what it's like when other kids bully someone. It's bad, okay? I'm not trying to scare you, but I need to educate you.” He knew Dimash couldn't understand him. But what if he could sort of understand the concept through some kind of osmosis or exchange of electrons? It was possible. “Watch carefully,” he said slowly and seriously.

Jaden sauntered in an exaggerated fashion. Dimash was right behind him, giggling. Jaden sighed. “No, no, no. No.
Nyet
.”

Dimash turned serious.

“Yes, good! This is serious!
Da!
”

Akerke suddenly called out behind them, “Jaden! You are here! You must come to the bonding. Director has said it. She is away but is coming back soon. She should not see you out here when you should be bonding.”

Jaden glanced at her, then ruffled Dimash's hair. “Okay, buddy, I'll see you.” He bounded up the steps. He felt he might have gotten through to Dimash, just a little. It made him want to jump up a hundred feet!

In the bonding room, not a single thing had changed with Ramazan. The baby's face was blank as a clean chalkboard. Penni walked up and down the room with Ramazan in her arms, her head pressed against his face, his emotionless eyes wide open. A woman Jaden hadn't seen before was playing the piano.

“Back so soon? How was it?” Steve asked.

Penni came over with the baby. “Was it fun?”

Jaden thought that over. “It was another universe, right in the same country as Kyzylorda city.”

“What did you learn?” Steve said.

“Not to lie to my wife someday.”

Penni and Steve just looked at him. “What does that have to do with eagles?” Steve said.

“Some eagles mate for life, so that taught me, uh, how to be fast . . . or something like that. It was cool. I'm glad I went.”

Jaden sat on the couch, trying to process his information overload. He tried to feel some kind of new power inside himself, but he still couldn't find it. What was the point of new power if you couldn't even feel it? He switched his mind over to the boy. Dimash had been happy to see him, and he'd been happy to see Dimash. They had bonded. This was exactly what the laws wanted kids and families to do. He wanted Dimash for a brother. But how could he make that happen?

Penni was placing Ramazan onto the floor, and then she and Steve sat down a few steps away. “Ramazaaaaan, crawl over heeeere, honey!” Steve said in a talking-to-a-baby voice Jaden had never heard from him.

Jaden sat on the floor next to Penni and Steve. “Mom, Ramazan is a great baby, don't get me wrong. But I think we should adopt Dimash. Someone else may adopt Ramazan, and he'll have a good life. He's a baby, and you told me everyone wants the babies. But nobody but us will adopt Dimash. Doesn't that mean the right thing to do is to adopt him?” Jaden paused, thinking, thinking. . . . Then he had it. “You're always telling me I should be good inside. You said that's the most important thing in the world. Wouldn't we be better inside if we adopted Dimash?”

Steve said, “Sometimes you need to make decisions that don't involve taking the most noble action but rather taking the action that is the most beneficial for you. That isn't always true, but there are decisions like that, Jaden. But I'm proud of you for what you've just said.”

Jaden was trying to manipulate Penni at the moment, not Steve. So he ignored Steve.

“Mom?” Jaden said. “Can we adopt him?”

She stared straight ahead, at where Ramazan was now lying on his back instead of crawling toward them. She took a big breath and tilted her head at Jaden, her eyes filling with tears.

“Oh, honey,” she said. “I don't think he's right for us. He's a beautiful boy, inside and out, I think, but that doesn't make him the child for us.”

Penni fixated on the baby again. “Ramazan, can you crawl to your mommy and daddy?”

Disappointment and worry washed over Jaden. He sat on the couch sideways, so he didn't have to watch Penni and Steve bonding with Ramazan.

When bonding finished that day, they watched TV at their apartment for a while, ate dinner at a café nearby, wandered around for half an hour, and finally went back and watched television again. It was all pretty different from seeing a man hunt with an eagle. Usually when they visited another place, Penni and Steve did touristy things, but here in Kyzylorda they had no interest in being tourists. They had a purpose, and that was to adopt a baby.

Since there weren't many shows in English on their cable, they ended up watching the usual women's billiards in English, the nature channel in English, or tennis matches narrated in Russian. During commercials they talked about women's billiards, lizards or other animals, and tennis. Lizards now seemed important, even to Jaden. It was just that you kind of glommed on to anything spoken in English, and that made the nature channel take on greater importance.

Finally Jaden went to his room to read about electricity, but for once he wasn't interested in it. He'd brought a great book called
The Spark of Life
that he'd read half of, but at the moment he just couldn't focus. He had too much to process. So he sat at the window, trying to turn himself off. Instead his mind traveled back to the morning. If he were Kazakh, he wouldn't mind being an eagle hunter. The experience had been kind of hypnotic, the way it brought you into the eagle's world. But what did Sam mean about being fast? And what about finding his power?

Penni rapped on the door—he recognized her soft knock—and then the door pushed open just a crack. “Good night, Jaden.”

“Good night, Mom.”

“Jaden?” He waited. “Do you like the baby?”

“I don't know. He doesn't do much.”

“I know. I don't think he's bonding with us. My goal is for us all to love one another before we leave Kazakhstan,” she said firmly.

“But, Mom, don't you like Dimash?”

“Very much,” she said as she walked into the room.

“I think it's fate that we take him,” Jaden said. “It is.”

“Oh, but, honey, I don't believe in fate.”

“It was fate that you adopted me!” Jaden cried out.

“It wasn't fate, it was chance. But any life that wouldn't have brought you into my family is not one I would have wanted to live,” she said, her eyes flashing.

That made Jaden feel something, but what? He didn't know. He didn't understand feelings so well.
Click
. He took a picture of himself, of his expression.

“I don't know if this baby is bonding,” Penni continued, sitting on the bed. “I can't get rid of the idea that Bahytzhan was supposed to be our child.” Then she gave her head a hard shake and forced a smile. “But Ramazan, he's a wonderful baby. I just want everything to work out. And then there's Dimash. But, honey, it would be so difficult. . . .”

“What?”

“Raising Dimash.”

“I would look out for him,” Jaden said eagerly. He stood up and took a few steps toward the bed.

“Would you?” Penni asked. “Would you?”

“I said it.”

“You've said many things,” Penni retorted.

“But, Mom, I mean it.”

Steve appeared in the doorway. “Who said what?”

“We were talking about Dimash,” Penni explained.

“Dimash,” Steve said. “Poor little guy. Beautiful kid, but we can't adopt Dimash.”

Jaden pounded his fist against his forehead three times. He knew they hated it when he did that, but he couldn't stop himself.

Steve looked at him coolly, and even Penni didn't react with worry like she usually did. Still, he could tell that Penni wanted to discuss all this further. But his heart abruptly went cold, and he didn't want to talk anymore. Dr. Wilder had tried making a chart with Jaden about these occasions when his heart went cold. But then it happened so much that they didn't know how to chart it anymore. Dr. Wilder couldn't find any pattern as to when it would happen.

“Good night, you guys.”

“Oh, I'm sorry, we're keeping you from your, uh, musings.” Penni stood up. “Good night.”

Chapter Twenty

J
aden turned off the light and sat at his window to watch the shepherd. There were eleven sheep and what looked like a dog, which occasionally ran in a little circle, as if playing. Shepherds in Kazakhstan were nomads, wandering across the land. Jaden tried to imagine himself in that kind of life, and somehow it made sense to him. No Penni, no Steve, no school, no destination. He took out his phone, and from the opposite side of the room, he snapped a picture of the window.

Then, without changing into his pajamas, he got in bed and fell into a deeply disturbed sleep where he wasn't sure what was real and what wasn't.

***

For some reason, the toddlers didn't seem to be on an exact schedule. Sometimes when Jaden arrived, Dimash was playing in the courtyard with the toddlers, and sometimes the courtyard was deserted. And then one day when they arrived, there was Dimash, shivering out in the rain, all by himself. He burst into tears when he saw Jaden and ran toward him, throwing his arms around Jaden and sobbing. Jaden hugged him tightly as rain washed over them. As if she were speaking from another world, he heard Penni saying, “Bring him inside, Jaden.”

“Which building do the toddlers live in?” he asked.

“Bring him inside this building to the director,” Steve said.

They'd just gone inside when one of the care­takers spotted them and grabbed Dimash and yelled at Jaden as if he were somehow responsible.

Jaden yelled back. “What was he doing outside on his own in the rain?”

The caretaker seemed taken aback and pulled Dimash away and outside, probably to where the toddlers lived.

The weather had grown cold so quickly. Jaden worried that the caretakers wouldn't be bringing the toddlers outside anymore because of the weather. How would he get to see Dimash if they were inside?

In the bonding room, Jaden plunked himself down next to Penni and Steve on the floor. A minute later he went to sit on the couch. He felt more worried than he'd ever felt since the day he got to America. Why had Dimash been outside on his own? And why was he crying? He felt his extremities tingling, and he wiggled his fingers and feet. He popped out of his seat and rushed down the steps outside, then picked up speed and threw himself on the ground right in front of Sam's car. He was lying there, enjoying the rain, when he felt Sam's hand on his back.

“What is it? Why were you running? What happened?”

“I don't know,” Jaden said. “I don't know. I had to.”

“Had to what? Let me see your hands! You're bleeding. Come. Get in car. It is too cold out here.”

Jaden examined the blood on his hands and wiped it on his face. When he'd lived in Romania, he'd been told that he would be put out on the streets at age twelve. Even if Dimash never aged out of being institutionalized, he would not have a good life. No, it was impossible for that to happen unless he was adopted. So what if his hands were bleeding? He had more important issues to think about.

Sam helped Jaden to his feet, and they both got into the car. At first they sat quietly. Finally Sam said, “Did you fall on purpose? It did not look like you tripped.”

“Yeah, sometimes I do that. I just, I don't know. I wish I could fly, but I can't. It makes me mad.”

Sam nodded wisely. “Yes, it makes me mad too, but that is no reason to wipe blood on your face. We cannot all be the eagle. We must find our own way. That is what the eagle has tried to teach you.”

Jaden wondered why he'd never rammed his face on the ground when he did his aggressive running. Maybe one day he would try that. But then he immediately rejected that thought, because he didn't want to harm his handsome face. He laid his head back against the headrest. “It doesn't hurt when I do it,” Jaden said. “One of my doctors said I can't feel pain.”

“Believe me, you can feel pain. You will learn that you can feel pain. It is a lesson we all must learn. You feel the pain and then you move on.”

“Are you bitter?” Jaden asked. He loved the word “bitter.” There were so many instances when it was the perfect word to use.

“Yes, I am bitter man. I am happy man, but bitter, too.”

“You can't be both at the same time. It's impos­sible.”

“You are telling me that it is impossible for me to be me?” Sam chuckled. “Believe me, I am me. I am quite possible.”

“There's a boy here named Dimash,” Jaden abruptly told Sam. “Akerke says he can't talk, think, or move well. There's something wrong with his brains and nerves and his stomach. I can't get my mind off him.”

“Yes, I have seen him. Someone gave his mother the evil eye while she was pregnant.”

“Is that what happened? Really?”

“I know it is so. The same thing happened to my nephew. A woman gave my sister the evil eye when she was pregnant, and her baby was born with very weak legs, as I mentioned to your parents.” Sam paused. “Now let me see your hands.”

Jaden held out his hands. There were a lot of scars on his palms, but the blood hid them at the moment. Sam took his hands and studied them. “You are lucky. It is mostly scraped. This cut here is not so good, but not so bad, either. You must promise me you will not do this again.”

“I promise,” said Jaden easily. Promises were nothing but a form of lying. The problem was, he knew he'd told the truth when he'd basically promised to take care of Dimash. But because of all his lying, Penni might not believe him.

A while later when Penni and Steve got to the car, Penni exclaimed, “Oh, Jaden! What now?” She spoke as if exhausted. She opened the car door and studied Jaden's face. “Did you do your aggressive running?” As an answer, Jaden turned his palms upward for her. She wrapped his hands in the blood-clotting gauze that she carried for just these occasions. “We'll need to clean this when we get back to the apartment. Sit in back with us. Akerke can sit in front.”

Jaden sat between Steve and Penni. Even though he was bloody and he knew that bothered them, he could also somehow feel that Steve and Penni were getting more and more relaxed about Ramazan. This would make it harder for him to make a case for Dimash. But he wouldn't give up.

Back in the apartment, Penni tenderly washed his hands with soap, then took out the alcohol wipes she'd also brought for an occasion like this. She was crying, as she sometimes did when she tended to his injuries. But her tears left him cold.

Later, at dinner in a small restaurant, Penni and Steve talked obsessively about their court date, which was in a few days. They worried that the judge might not like them, that the prosecutor would ask them questions they didn't have answers for, and that the final decision would be put off until another day.

That night Jaden stayed up for hours, staring at the dark ceiling.