Love Anthony (23 page)

Eighth grade all over again. At least my accident happened at home and not at the playground in front of the “in” moms.

It occurred to me while I was driving to CVS for the second time today that I’ve spent my whole life since eighth grade terrified of being the outsider, doing almost anything to fit in, always desperate to belong. Anthony doesn’t worry about any of this. He doesn’t mind being by himself. He enjoys it. He doesn’t care what people think. He’s not going to get caught up in wanting expensive designer clothes or the latest $100 sneakers. He’s not going to drink or smoke pot to look cool. He’s not going to do anything because everyone else is doing it.

He doesn’t care what other people wear or think or do. He likes what he likes. He does what he wants to do. Until I say it’s time to go and rip him out of his swing.

I thought about those kids playing Follow the Leader today. Anthony will never be a follower. He won’t be the leader though either. This thought would normally shred my heart and make me weepy, but as I drove to CVS, I felt unexpectedly at peace.

He’s simply not playing that game.

CHAPTER 22

I am swinging on the swing at the playground. I love swinging. Swinging puts me in my body.

I usually know I have hands, but if anything interesting is going on, if I’m counting or thinking or watching TV, my body disappears from me. I don’t have a voice, so people sometimes treat me like I also don’t have a body, like I don’t exist in the world. And because most of the time I’m not aware of my body, I think they might be right. Maybe I don’t really exist in the world.

Swinging makes me exist in the world.

My thinking often gets stuck repeating. If I find a thought I like, I think it again so I can keep enjoying it. These kinds of thoughts are like Pringles. Pringles are so yummy, I never want to eat just one. I want to eat another and another and another. If I find a yummy thought, I want to think it again and again and again. But if I think it too much, then I don’t just want to think it. I NEED to think it because I’m afraid if I don’t always keep it with me, I might lose it forever. So my thinking gets stuck a lot on the same idea again and again and again. And when this happens, nothing else exists.

The other day I got stuck on Three Blind Mice. I said these three words inside my head, loving them for a whole morning. Nothing else existed. Not even me. I became those three words. Three Blind Mice.

But I don’t get stuck on Three Blind Mice right now because I’m swinging. When I swing, I am no longer my repeating thoughts. When I swing, I am a repeating body. I am moving through air, forward and down and up, backward and down and up, forward and down and up, backward and down and up. I am Anthony’s body, repeating this perfect rhythm. I swing, and I am here!

I am forward and down and up, backward and down and up, feeling the cool air tickle my face. My face is smiling. My face is real.

Then my mother stops the swing and says something about going over to the sandbox. I flap my hands and make a noise to let her know that I don’t like her idea. I don’t want to get off the swing. I flap and make a noise because my voice won’t say the word NO.

My mother understands me and starts the swing moving again.

I love sand. I love to scoop up as much as my hands can hold, raise my hands high, and let the sand spill down. I love the feel of the sand moving through my fingers, how it drizzles and sparkles in the air like music as it falls. It’s almost as good as water.

But sand in a playground sandbox is not like sand at the beach. Sand in a playground sandbox is always too close to other kids. When I play with sand in a playground sandbox, another mother will tell me I can’t play with the sand. She’ll say,
Please stop doing that, the sand is blowing into people’s eyes.
And my mother will take me out of the sandbox because I won’t stop doing that, and I also don’t know how to
share the sand
.

My mother stops me again and wants me to go over to the slide. I make a noise and flap my hands, and she starts the swing moving again. Forward and down and up, backward and down and up.

I don’t like the slide. Sometimes kids will walk up the slide on their feet instead of sliding down the slide on their bottoms, and that is breaking the rules. If I’m at the top of the slide and another kid starts climbing up the slide, then I don’t know what to do. I can’t slide down because the kid is in the way, but I can’t climb back DOWN the steps because the slide steps are for climbing UP. That is the rule. So on the slide, I might have no solution to my problem, and I don’t want that.

And out on the playground, a kid might hit me or push me or ask me a question. The mothers always ask me a question, invading me with their eyes and an UP sound at the end of their voices.
What is your name?
But my voice doesn’t work, so I can’t even tell them that I don’t want to answer their questions.

On the swing, I feel protected from all of this. No one can touch me, no one wants me to say my name, and no one is telling me not to play with sand. I only want to swing.

My mother stops the swing again, but this time she doesn’t say anything about the playground. She starts taking me out. I make a loud noise and flap my hands, letting her know that this is not okay with me. She keeps taking me out.

NO! More swinging! I’m not done. I want to stay in the swing! I want to stay in my body! NO! I want to exist in the world! I need to keep my body repeating or I might lose my body forever. I might be gone forever!

I scream really loud, trying to show my mother that I need to keep swinging or I might die, but for some reason,
she doesn’t understand what I’m showing her. I go stiff, trying to keep my body in the swing, but she’s too strong and she doesn’t understand, and she grabs my body away. I squeeze my eyes shut so I won’t see my body leaving the swing. I scream even louder so everything about my stolen body and the swing disappears, and only the sound of my screaming exists.

The next thing I know, I’m not outside anymore. I’m in the car, watching Barney. I’m watching Barney and his friends, and they’re doing what I know they should be doing. I stop screaming. I’m not dead because I’m watching Barney. I’m okay.

But then I’m not okay. The car is going the WRONG WAY. The way the car is going is not the way home. The way home is by three white houses, then one brick house, then a street, then one yellow house and two white houses, then a red light/green light. Then church, the trees, one brown house, one white house, one gray house with peeling paint, then Pigeon Lane, the street that HOME is on.

But we did not go this way. This way is a sign with a picture of a girl on it, then a brown house, a white house, a blue house, then a street, a building, a parking lot, a red light. This is not the way HOME. We ALWAYS go HOME after the playground, and this way does not match the map in my head that shows the way home.

I don’t know where we’re going, but we’re not going home. I am not going home to have three chicken nuggets with ketchup on my blue plate with juice in my Barney cup for lunch at the kitchen table. I’m not going to see Danyel after lunch because Danyel comes to my home, and I will not be home. I will be somewhere else.

Maybe we are lost, and maybe I will never see my home again. The rule is we ALWAYS go HOME after the playground, and this is breaking the rule. If this rule
can break, then anything can break. Maybe the world is breaking.

I am screaming. I want to go HOME. I want to get out of this car that is going the wrong way, but I am trapped in this seat. I am screaming, filling with hot, scary liquid. The hot, scary liquid keeps filling me, until I’m too full and burning on the inside. I shake my hands to spill some of the hot, scary liquid out through my fingers, but the hot, scary liquid keeps filling me, too huge and hot and fast for my fingers to empty.

I close my eyes so I don’t have to see the wrong houses and buildings and streets. I’m screaming as loud as I can so I can become the sound of my scream and not a boy trapped in a car seat who is no longer swinging but going very fast in the wrong direction.

When I open my eyes, I realize I’m no longer screaming. I’m lying under my Barney blanket in my bed. I see the tree outside the window, my box of rocks, the calendar on the wall. I know this is good because this means I am home, and this also means that the world didn’t break, but I don’t feel good yet. I feel sweaty and tired, and I still feel too much hot, scary liquid bubbling and sloshing around inside that needs to leak out to make room for feeling good.

I lie in bed and wonder how we got home. There must be a different way. I wonder why we went a different way.

Today is Monday. It is sunny and warm. I am wearing brown pants and a red shirt. Maybe on sunny, warm Mondays when I wear brown pants and a red shirt, after my mother says I’m done swinging at the playground, we go a different way home. Maybe on sunny, warm Mondays when I wear brown pants and a red shirt and we leave the playground to go home, we go by the sign with a picture of a girl on it, then a brown house, then a white house, a
blue house, a street, a building, a parking lot, and a red light. Maybe this is a new rule.

I’m hungry now. I go downstairs with both feet on all twelve steps and into the kitchen. My three chicken nuggets with ketchup on my blue plate, my Barney cup with juice, my fork, and white napkin are all on the table for lunch, just like they always are. My mother isn’t sitting at the table, but I feel her nearby. I flap my hands and jump and let out one of my happy sounds, getting rid of the last drops of the hot, scary liquid inside me.

I sit down and eat my lunch. I feel good. But then I have a thought I don’t like. I didn’t know there were a NUMBER of ways home from the playground. Now there are TWO ways to come home from the playground. I don’t like that number two. Two is in the middle of things. Two is unfinished. Two is in between, and I don’t like in between. I wish there were THREE ways to come home from the playground.

The first way, which is the old way, goes by three white houses, then one brick house, then a street, then one yellow house and two white houses, then a red light/green light. Then church, the trees, one brown house, one white house, one gray house with the peeling paint, then Pigeon Lane. The second way, the new way we go on warm, sunny Mondays when I wear brown pants and a red shirt, is by the sign with a picture of a girl on it, then a brown house, then a white house, a blue house, a street, a building, a parking lot, and a red light, and some other stuff I didn’t see before Pigeon Lane because I had my eyes shut.

There has to be one more way. There have to be THREE ways on the map from the playground to home. But what if there are only two ways, and that is it? What if we are stuck with two?

I feel the hot, scary liquid rushing at me again, but I see it coming this time. I shut the door on it before it can even touch my toes, before it has the chance to flood me.

Three Blind Mice. Three Blind Mice. Three Blind Mice.

Three Blind Mice. Three Blind Mice. Three Blind Mice.

Three Blind Mice. Three Blind Mice. Three Blind Mice.

CHAPTER 23

A
fter finishing another chapter, Beth left the library early and is now sitting on a couch in Dr. Campbell’s office, which is really the living room in Dr. Campbell’s house, wishing she’d waited in the car. She’s on time, and Jimmy’s late, and she feels unbearably self-conscious sitting alone on a marriage counselor’s couch with nothing to say.