John
The summer he was six months old, my son learned to sing himself to sleep.
I'd put him to bed in his crib, go downstairs, turn on the baby monitor and marvel. He couldn't walk or talk, could barely sit up, but he could sing. I tried to pick out snatches of familiar tunes, but this was improvising, scat singing. He hummed and gurgled and babbled, and he sang until he dropped off.
I thought it was amazing that at such a young age, he'd learned how to comfort himself. I imagined self-reliance, independence, all sorts of things that parents try to intuit and project when their children are babies. I knew nothing about him.
He was the most charming child, affectionate and smart. Everyone loved John, and John loved everyone. He was impulsive, remarkably so. Doing a little shopping at Sears, you had to keep him close by or in five seconds he'd be out in the mall, talking to strangers.
One day, when he was 3, he decided to go get the mail. He headed out the back door as I went out the front. A long private road runs downhill from my house to the street, and across that is the mailbox.
It's a busy street. The speed limit is 35, but you know people. Busy people. Teenagers. You have to look both ways, maybe a couple of times. And as his little legs pumped furiously, heading for the mailbox, I knew John wouldn't.
I caught up with him about 20 feet before the street and tackled him. He giggled and I held him in my arms, huffing and puffing from the chase, trying to bury the image of what might have been and knowing it would show up in my nightmares, which it did and does.
He had a great laugh. John laughed from his toes up, putting his heart and soul into it, holding onto his stomach and rolling on the ground. To call it infectious would be a slight; he made you laugh with him, made you feel the joy.
And then he stopped.
He laughs now but I don't believe it. It sounds forced, an arbitrary compression of the diaphragm, as if he knows something is funny, knows he should laugh, but somehow can't make the connection work. Which, neurologically speaking, might be as close to an explanation as we're likely to find.
I knew nothing about autism except how to spell it. I didn't know the range of behaviors or the levels of functionality. I just knew my son didn't have it, because he was sociable and friendly.
Except when he wasn't. The rages started when he was about 4, and they were ugly. His rage, my rage. One day he punched his mother, just hauled off and decked her. I grabbed him and dragged him to his bedroom, tossing him on the bed. I've never had the stomach for corporal punishment, so I just yelled at him, and he yelled back. He was out of control, writhing and screaming in anger, and in my frustration, I slammed his closet door, shattering the mirror.
He screamed louder, now horror mixed with rage, and he pointed his finger at me. "YOU did it! YOU did it!" So I picked up a nearly full water bottle, emptied it over his head, and stormed out.
His mother went in a bit later, when the screaming stopped. She found him sitting on the floor in the dark, surrounded by shards of broken mirror, soaked to the skin and shivering. He looked up. "I'm cold," he said.
We wear the chains we forge in this life, the regrets and the mistakes. I live with the knowledge I have now, knowing that to a child tormented and confused by sensory stimuli, raising your voice or dousing him with water is an attack, a threat. I might as well have lit him on fire.
We're all still learning. He's 13 now, and started the eighth grade this week, his first "normal" school in three years. It sounds like he's coping okay, but then that's always been his strength. He's smart and interesting. He's obviously different.
He functions well. Sometimes he rides his bike to McDonald's and buys himself lunch. I send him to get the mail all the time. He always looks both ways.
But he lost his laugh, and I think sometimes it's my fault. I think I should have known, should have recognized signs, should have understood and should have done something earlier. Thousands of dollars have been spent on counseling, psychiatrists, psychologists, therapists, medications and tests. We've done the best we could, but I still wonder, still think I could have intervened at the beginning, helped him more. This is stupid, I know. Still. I have nightmares.
I never catch him. My legs move slowly, dream slow-motion, and he runs across the street and doesn't look. I see the car hit him, see his little body thrown in the air, and as I reach him he lies bloody and broken on the road. He looks up at me, face filled with rage, and he screams, "YOU did it!" and for some reason I think he's right.
6:27:20 AM 
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