Like No Other Boy Read online

  Finally, Tommy did the only thing he could. He screamed one final time, blew out a gush of air, then held his breath until his face turned red, and then—one, two, three—collapsed solidly against me with one final whine. He wasn’t unconscious, just suddenly and overwhelmingly exhausted.

  I looked up at the sky and said a thank you—relief at last. I smoothed a hand down the side of my face and exhaled slowly, my heart thumping.

  “It’s okay, Tom-Tom. It’s all okay. You’re going to be fine.”

  “Fine?” he mimicked, finally catching his breath and breathing normally again.

  “Yes, fine.”

  “Fine?”

  “Yes. Fine.”

  “Fine? Fine. Fine? Fine . . . Fiiiiinnnnne . . .” Saliva drooled from his lips down to his chin.

  Then a hand went to his mouth. Hunched over and weary, Tommy moped by my side as we trudged toward the car at last. I nudged him forward. Lines of sweat continued to stream down Tommy’s face, which had turned pale. He clicked his teeth together.

  “’Oken?” He looked up at me again, his eyes connecting with me for just a second. “’Ooooken?” He stretched out his hand.

  “Sure, ’oken.” I handed him a blue one, wondering if color might have made a difference. Unfortunately, the desire for the token hadn’t been strong enough to intrude on the tantrum. I made note of that to tell the teacher. “It’s all yours. Have at it.”

  He stared at the token and turned it over in his hands. “’Oookennnnnn.”

  When we finally made it to my car, I buckled Tommy into the backseat with a dusty Radar at his side and exhaled loudly. I slung Mister Backpack into the passenger’s seat. My back was hurting. I climbed into the driver’s seat and just stared straight ahead for a long moment, hands on the steering wheel. A great wad of sadness filled my gut. I blamed myself, too. I should have seen it coming. I carried ear plugs in Mister Backpack because of his noise sensitivity, but why hadn’t I given them to him? This surely wasn’t the first time I’d screwed up. I had to be more on the ball. But it wasn’t just me, either. What about all the therapies he’d undergone, all the time and money we’d spent? Applied Behavioral Analysis, psychologists, so many so-called experts on how to deal with autism, and this was where we stood: Tantrum City. Gnawing on his hands. Self-abuse.

  Tommy started zooming Radar in the air, then hugged the stuffed pet. “Fine . . . fine . . . fine . . . buuuuuu . . . Ouuuuuoooo . . . mmmmm . . .”

  I took my pulse, which was still racing NASCAR style, while Tommy was now acting as if the tantrum hadn’t even happened, as if the past fifteen minutes had simply disappeared from his awareness. “Fine . . . ouuuuu . . . ” He hugged Radar and talked soft, gentle nonsense to his pet. “Ooouuuu . . . goooom . . . treeeeeesta . . . beeeesh . . .”

  Sometimes, I wondered if my son even had a sense of the past.

  “Well, time for home, Tom-Tom.” No sense in wallowing at this point. I started the car, pushing down the accelerator a few times to get the old man cranking. This car suffered from mechanical arthritis, unlike the leased Benz I used to drive when my financial life was hitting on all cylinders.

  “’Kay, Daddy. ‘Kay.”

  Keeping the car in park, I turned around and studied Tommy and his reddened hands, the dull distance in his eyes. I thought of something.

  “Hey, would you like to come back another day and see the chimps again?” I asked.

  “Yes, Daddy. Yes.” He gave me direct eye contact.

  Bingo. That was the answer I’d been looking for. I turned around in my seat and plugged my phone into the car’s charger, then dialed Cheryl’s number, excited to tell her what had just happened at the zoo. The tantrum, I would refrain from mentioning. When she didn’t answer, I found myself rambling into her voicemail.

  “Cheryl, look, it’s me. The craziest thing just happened at the zoo with these chimps, I mean, Tommy and the chimps, I don’t know. Christ. I don't even know how to explain it all. Give me a call ASAP, all right? It’s just totally bizarre. You should have seen it.”

  I ended the call and sat back in my seat, my mind already flowing around the idea of getting access to chimpanzees on a regular basis so that Tommy could, what? Talk to them?

  Yes.

  Absolutely.

  Chapter 2

  A half hour later and with Tommy at my side, I opened the door to my condo on Coronado and stepped inside. My aging fox-red Labrador greeted us as if he hadn’t seen us in days, nights, and weekends. Maybe even decades. Max was my anchor, my true companion, and, to be honest, not a bad psychotherapist to boot.

  “Hey, Max, how goes it? You miss us? You miss us? Huh?” I said as I placed Mister Backpack in a corner in the hall.

  Being hit by a car when he was a pup had left old Max with a maimed right front leg, but it didn’t do a thing to curtail his bright-eyed gusto. As Tommy and I shuffled into the foyer, Max nuzzled us and barked, speaking back to us in his doggie way.

  “Settle down, boy.” He shook not only his tail, but his entire hindquarters, looking up at me with canine reverence. “You missed us, didn’t you? I know you did.”

  “Max, Max.” Tommy petted my true companion with gentle caresses, his admiring eyes lingering over the dog. Theirs was a special relationship too. There were times when they would stare at each other so intensely I swear it looked as if the two of them were sharing a secret, and then Max would bring Tommy a toy or Radar from another room. I wondered if there was a connection between what Tommy did with Max and what had happened with the chimps.

  Max shoved his nose into Tommy’s palm, into his stomach, and then sniffed me as well, taking in huge gulps of olfactory information. He snorted and shook his head.

  “Smell us, Max,” Tommy said in his robotic way. “Big.”

  “Yes, I know.” I chuckled. “I bet we just blew that dog’s mind. He’s probably dying to know where we’ve been.” Smiling, I knelt down to Max’s level, rubbing his ears. “We’ve been to the zoo, Max. You should have seen all the animals there. Lions, tigers, and bears.”

  Max barked as if he totally understood. Sure, of course. I get it. The zoo. I let him outside to do his business in the backyard.

  “TV, Daddy?” Tommy said, hugging Radar against his chest again.

  We moved into the den where sailing pictures taken by a local photographer hung on wood-paneled walls and three Voice Arts Awards—ego-boosters that had long ago lost their power to console me—rested on a shelf next to the pictures. I glanced at the three overdue bills waiting for me, sitting on my end table: cable, electric, and phone. A nasty triumvirate. Even worse: I was one month behind on my mortgage, a fact that kept me up at night, staring at my ceiling as I wondered how I was going to come up with the money.

  “Sure, TV’s fine,” I said. The weight of my financial insecurity had been sitting on top of me ever since the divorce. Cheryl had always been the one with the steady paycheck. I used to have a steady job too with a company called Focus Media as creative director. But once I’d entered the up-and-down freelance VO game, where the only jobs I got were the result of my own networking capabilities, it was goodbye steady paycheck for me.

  Tommy kicked off his shoes. We sat down on my brown smooth-leather couch.

  “Let’s see what’s on.”

  I switched on my fifty-six-inch HDTV, which got every channel in the known universe, and scrolled around until I landed on Tommy’s all-time fav—Cartoon Network.

  Tommy fell into TV reverie, hands at his sides, legs crossed. When he watched, he really watched, totally focused. But unlike most children with autism, he didn’t have a single cartoon show he was fixated on. He was flexible that way, surprisingly enough.

  “’Tooooon,” he said, eyes glued to the screen as Steven’s Universe was just ending.

  Leaving Tommy’s side, I went to my bar, which was in a room off the kitchen, and drew a sense of comfort from the bottles of SKYY vodka, Kahlua, and a Napa pinot noir ensconced in my wine rack. I took
a towel and wiped the burgundy-colored granite countertop, then fixed myself and Tommy glasses of orange juice, adding a splash of vodka to mine. I needed it after our day at the zoo. My back was still hurting. And that tantrum . . . wow. I went to the kitchen, put together some squared-cheese blocks and crackers on a plate, and brought them in as well. As I sat down next to him, the memory of Tommy’s world-class meltdown ricocheted through my mind.

  How could I love my son so much and yet, sometimes just want to strangle him at the same time?

  “TV time for a while. Just you and me, okay?” I said, as we kicked back like frat pals. I plopped my long legs on the coffee table.

  “Daddy. Teeeveeee.” Tommy’s tongue circled his lips as he rubbed his nose.

  The Justice League came on, the episode beginning with Hawkgirl, a superhero who communicates with birds, locked in a vault deep inside the core of a distant planet.

  “Daddy. Girl.” The words dropped from his mouth, one at a time. His ability to express himself was so difficult, it took such effort.

  “Yes, Hawkgirl. She’s in trouble,” I said. “For sure.”

  Tommy sat there, riveted. Did he empathize with Hawkgirl’s lonely predicament, locked up as she was in her own faraway world?

  “Hey, Tommy. What do you think’s going to happen?” I asked when the show went to a commercial. Max, who I’d let back inside, limped over and curled up on the floor next to us, flicking his tail, his dark, shiny eyes rooted on mine for a long moment. “Can you tell Daddy? What do you think’s going to happen to Hawkgirl? Is someone going to save her? Huh?”

  Tommy gobbled some cheese and crackers, then once again, fidgeted and flew off into Tommy-space. His silent language echoed and boomed like a bass drum. Then he opened his mouth wide.

  “Oooouu. Ooouuu, eeeee, grrrrrraaahhh . . .”

  His tongue appeared, doing the infamous around-the-world lick of his lips. “They . . . they . . . be . . .”

  “Yes?” I clutched my glass.

  But the words that lingered on the tip of his tongue and on the edge of his mind somehow refused to appear.

  Tommy used the palm of his hand to hit himself on his forehead.

  My chest heaved.

  “Don’t do that, son. That’s not good for you. You know that.” I spoke as gently as I could.

  “No, Daddy. No . . .” Then it was as if he pushed one single word out of his mouth and birthed it: “Saaaaay.”

  “What?” I leaned forward.

  “No . . . saaaaay . . .” He looked stricken and clasped his hands together as he fell into an even deeper silence. His tight grimace suggested to me he truly wanted to tell me something, but found himself unable to express himself. When a tear welled up in his eye, I was stunned. My hand went to my throat as I sat up straight, then set my drink down on the coffee table. Tommy wiped the tear away and my heart lurched in my chest. I’d never seen him cry before.

  “It’s okay, Tom-Tom.” I sighed, feeling his pain, so close to him. “It’s okay. I know words are hard for you.”

  “No.” Tommy sucked a hand. “No, me . . . saaaaaay.” He hugged Radar. He was confiding in me, telling me something as best he could.

  “You’ll get the hang of it.” I swallowed. “I swear you will, okay? I understand.”

  The truth was, despite all the research I’d done on autism, despite all the therapies and counseling we’d been through, I didn’t understand a thing. I wiped my hands on my pants and felt a weight in my heart as large and as ponderous as the moon.

  When another commercial began, I changed the channel and suddenly, there I was on TV, my voice anyway. I had to laugh as I took a sip of my drink. I was telling the people of San Diego and surrounding areas about a furniture company’s amazingly spectacular tent sale.

  “This week only, friends. Prices starting from just five-ninety-nine. If you want the best deal in town on a comfortable sectional . . .”

  It wasn’t my best work, but I didn’t sound half bad. Thirty seconds of fame. Too bad the jobs had mostly dried up. I used to go into the studio, lay down my track in front of the mic with headphones on, and then rush to the next job, flushed with a good income. I even had a few national accounts. But ever since the divorce and my subsequent year-long depression, which knocked me out of the VO scene—I mean, how can you work when you can hardly get out of bed?—I now sat around waiting for the phone to ring. My networking capabilities had really suffered.

  “Hey, Tom-Tom, that was Daddy on TV.” I touched his arm. “Cool, huh?”

  But Tommy only gave me one quick glance, and then started to rock himself.

  Leaving him alone, I got out my laptop and Googled chimps and autism. I just had to see if there was any kind of documented relationship. To my surprise, there wasn’t a thing on the subject. Totally new territory. No relationship at all as far as Google could tell me. I was surprised. I thought there’d be at least something of interest. I would have to look more later on.

  Another change of channels landed us on Animal Planet. Strangely enough, a group of chimpanzees living in the wilds of Africa filled the screen.

  “Wow! Look at that, Tom-Tom. Chimps!” I said.

  I sat up straight and watched the action as Tommy clapped his hands and nodded, then pointed at the TV. Once again, in the presence of chimps, he seemed to show a burst of excitement. Max had lifted his head and was staring at the screen as well, taking it in. The dog watched TV all the time.

  “Chimpies!” he said without his monotone, a voice filled with enthusiasm. “TV, Daddy!”

  “Yes, there they are! They’re your friends. Right?” I pointed at the TV and nodded, smiling.

  These chimps were using tools to catch ants. They worked as a team, helping each other as they employed long sticks to siphon ants out of the ground. Once again, I was witness to how humanlike they were, so fascinatingly similar to us, yet so curiously different. When the camera zoomed in for a close-up, the eyes of the chimps gleamed with a wily intelligence. They were so active, like ADHD kids before they took their Ritalin. One chimp raised an arm high in the air as if he were waving at the cameraman, just holding it up like that, a chimp hello-wave that wouldn’t stop. Hello. Hello. Hello. And hello! A real comedian, that one.

  Something shivered through my spine as Tommy scrambled off the couch and inched closer toward the TV until he was no more than a foot away, standing there, mesmerized.

  “Chimpies!” He clapped his hands. “They . . . chimpies!”

  “You like them, don’t you?” I said.

  Tommy nodded vigorously, his eyes on fire as he turned to me. “Yes, Daddy! Like!”

  Max, who was still watching the TV screen himself, barked as if he was telling us he liked them too.

  “Well, I think they like you.” My body tingled and my mouth grew dry. While Tommy continued watching, I stepped outside with Max on my heels and phoned Cheryl again. I just had to tell her what I’d seen. Our trip to the zoo today could be a life-changing event. She needed to know. But my call went to voicemail once again. I could only leave another message.

  “Cheryl, will you please call me? I have to tell you about what I saw today at the zoo. You won’t believe it.”

  * * *

  That night, after I bathed him, I handed Tommy first his 5 mg of melatonin, which he downed with a glass of water, then his small dose of Wellbutrin. We stood next to each other in his bathroom. He was dressed in his Care Bear pjs and looked particularly handsome, all clean and fresh.

  “Geen,” Tommy said. Before swallowing it, he inspected the Wellbutrin tablet, studying it like a scientist. The pill had a perfect line down the middle and a “W” engraved in the marbled surface. “Tiny geen.”

  “Yes, sir. Green. Just for you. You like green.” I smiled.

  “Cooooo geeen.” He finally swallowed it with water.

  Tommy was sensitive to colors, even shades of colors, light green, royal blue, pinks, and reds. That was why I’d wondered if the color of the token
in the parking lot at the zoo would have made a difference to him. We were working on a reading book that assigned colors to letters of the alphabet, hoping to improve his phonetics. We hadn’t made any breakthroughs yet, but it was holding his interest and showed promise.

  I’d painted his bedroom in the colors of his choice, red and bright yellow—gaudy as hell. He seemed to enjoy the process and I didn’t want to stymie it. How hard it must be for him, I thought, unable to filter out the world the way normal children did. If colors helped him somehow organize his reality, who was I to stand in his way?

  I took a big breath and thought about what was coming next. Maybe I should just let it go for tonight, I thought. But I just couldn’t do it. Besides, I had to be as good a parent as Cheryl, who I considered the master parent, and I knew she wouldn’t avoid the process, difficult as it was.

  “And now it’s time to brush, Tommy.” I pulled out his purple Cartoon Network toothbrush and dabbed the bristles with white toothpaste. “You get two tokens if you brush without a fuss tonight.” I grinned at him big time.

  “No brush!” Tommy stared at himself in the mirror and pulled a defiant face, his nose and jaw twisted in rebelliousness as he pinched his mouth shut. He shook his head right and left.

  “Come on, Tommy, brush your teeth, old sonny boy, you can do it.” I mimicked Larry the Lobster, and then switched to Clarence, that pudgy CN star, whose vocal range seemed to oddly dwell somewhere between a man’s and boy’s: “Your teeth need to be brushed young man. Do you understand what I say?”

  Tommy’s yellowed teeth reflected the fact that he simply refused to brush. The sensory overload of brushing was too much for him. Cheryl and I had tried everything, from cute puppet shows about how fun it is to brush teeth to emotional arm-twisting of the most severe kind. We had no idea how many cavities he had.

  “No brush!” Tommy pressed his lips close. I wielded the toothbrush around in the air, brandishing it. It was man against boy in a battle to the death. He shook his head and stubbornly closed his eyes. He grunted, keeping his lips pinched together. “Mmmmmm . . .”