Toward the Sound of Chaos (22 page)

Ellie

“
H
ey
baby,” I say, as Spence stalks into the kitchen—as much as anyone can stalk on
crutches. He has a backpack slung over his shoulder and he’s dressed in his
pajamas and one running shoe. The other foot is still in the cast. “You wearing
that to school?”

It
isn’t the first time my kid has decided PJ Fridays should be a thing.

“Not
going to school,” he grumbles, sitting at the table. His crutches and bag fall
to the floor with a clamor, and he picks up a piece of dry toast from my plate,
shoving it in his mouth.

I
blink in surprise, though I’m not sure what’s more alarming. The attitude, or
the fact that he ate toast instead of Cheerios from his orange bowl. “Uh, yes,
you most certainly are going to school. Aren’t you getting an award today for
your writing?”

“School
sucks.”

I
whirl on him. “You watch your mouth, mister.”

“It
does suck. Everything sucks. I hate you.” He stands and kicks his chair over.

I
take a deep breath. I know they’re just words, and he’s frustrated and not
communicating properly, but boy do they sting like a bitch.

Without
his crutches, Spence heads for the back door and begins yanking on it, unable
to turn the locks. He’s like Houdini, always wandering off. One minute he’s
there and the next . . . gone.

He
tugs at the door, and then starts screaming at the top of his lungs. “I hate
you, I hate you, I hate you!”

I
race over and pry his hands from the handle. All three locks are dead bolted,
but it makes no difference—he’d claw his fingers down to stubs if he could.

Spencer
gives up on the door and starts hitting himself in the head, turning his anger
inward. He never hurts me; not intentionally, anyway.

With
a fair amount of struggling, I loop one arm around his, restraining it behind
him. He lashes out with the other, hitting himself over and over with a series
of harsh slaps to the ear until I can get him under control, and then we fall
back against the floorboards.

Panting
from exertion, I whisper in his ear, “Spence, breathe, baby. I need you to
breathe and count with me, okay? One, two, three . . .” I’m the only one
counting. His whole body is rigid from head to toe, and he struggles against me
again.

“I
hate you. I wish Mr. Williams shot you instead. I wish Jake was my daddy and
you just went away forever. You’re the worst mother ever.”

I
wrap my arms tighter around him. I’m shaking, but I don’t know if it’s him or
me, or our combined anger and devastation that’s causing the world to shudder.

“You
are not allowed to hate me, Spencer Mason,” I whisper, but the dam bursts and
the words come out on a sob. “I am your mother, and I love you with my whole
heart, and you are not allowed to leave me because I’d be alone. I’d be
heartbroken without you.”

“I
don’t care. I wanna see Jake. You never let me see Jake and Nuke anymore. You
pushed them away and now they hate us.”

“No,
honey, Jake and Nuke could never hate you,” I say, smoothing my hand over his
forehead. He flinches away from the touch and my heart breaks a little more.

“Everyone
hates me.”

“No.
Everyone loves you, Spencer. You have so much special inside you that everyone
you meet can see it. People see it from miles away.”

“You’re
a liar. Jake wouldn’t have left if he could see my special.”

“Honey,
what happened with Jake had nothing to do with you,” I say.
It was my fault
.
I hadn’t guarded my heart. I let him get too close and it ruined us both. I let
him in and he broke me because he was broken, and no matter how hard I tried I
couldn’t piece him back together. I didn’t realize those cracks had affected my
son so badly. “Sometimes, no matter how much you love someone, sometimes you
need to let them go so they can fix themselves.”

“Are
you gonna let me go, Mamma?” he says morosely.

“No.
You’re not broken. You’re just different, and different is beautiful.” I sniff.
“No matter how long you walk this earth, no matter how many times you say you
hate me, I’ll never let you go. That’s why I need you to love me back, because
who else is going to do it as much as you?”

“Jake,”
he says matter-of-factly, and I nod, because I don’t doubt that what he’s
saying isn’t true. Not even for a second. I know Jake loves me, the same as he
knows I love him, but it doesn’t matter, because I can’t be what he needs, and
he can’t give me what I need, so we’ll always be at an impasse. We’ll always be
outside, looking through the glass but never able to breach the walls we put in
place to guard our hearts.

Ellie

Two
months later

I
sit across the breakfast table from my son and stare out the kitchen window on
the newly landscaped backyard. The fence Jake put up is still going strong, but
I had a carpenter come in and finish it off with a gate, ready for today’s
surprise. Spencer and I finally did the gardens, planting brightly colored
petunias in the soil beside the back porch, and we even put in a vegie garden
around the side and planted tomatoes, spinach, and a couple stalks of corn.

The
house across the street has been cleaned up, gutted, and renovated the way I
know Mr. Williams had always wanted. It is on the market now. We couldn’t live
there. I’d had one hell of a time cleaning out the place considering I’d seen
the man blow his brains all over the wall, but after the initial shock of
walking through that front door, I’d cleaned and sorted, donated his furniture
and clothing to goodwill, and kept the important things like his Military
memorabilia, old family photos and the things that reminded us of him. I’d even
taken a few shirts and knickknacks over to Miss Chelle’s place, and she’d
broken down and wept. She’d told me over tea about their long, sordid past.

I
glance at my baby boy as he chews his cereal. Despite getting his cast off just
yesterday, he looks as miserable as he has for two months. We’ve been going to
Duck Pond Beach every morning as usual, but there has been no Jake Tucker and
no Nuke. I know that’s my doing, but still, every time I drive down North Beach
Road, I feel a pang of despair at not getting to see the two of them.

 Since
Mr. Williams died, I haven’t seen him show interest in a single thing. All of
the books and war memorabilia got shoved inside the closet the second I handed them
to him, and Spencer shut down any conversation regarding their whereabouts.

Until
a few nights back, when I woke to a strange sound coming from his room. I found
Spence under the sheets, ripping out pages from his favorite book. It’d hurt
seeing him destroy something that he’d loved so much, and I couldn’t help but
think of Jake and the way he’d destroyed us in his grief. Spencer needed an
outlet to grieve, not just the loss of his friend Mr. Williams, but also the
loss of Jake and Nuke in his life. I’d had half a mind to pick up the phone
then and there. Instead, I’d climbed into his bed and began asking questions
about the pictures with him until he fell asleep. In the morning, I’d taken all
the pieces into the salon where I’d begun taping it all back together between
processing Miss Maggie’s color and setting Miss Chelle’s waves.

“Hey,
Spence?” I ask. He gives me a glum look around a mouthful of Cheerios. “I was
thinking; it’s been kind of quiet around here lately.”

His
eyes go wide and he shoots up from the table. “Let’s call Jake and Nuke. I
promise I won’t go crazy and hurt my hurty leg.”

Wow.
The kid knows how to drive a blade right through your heart. “Well, I was
thinking now that we own this place, it might be time to go see Olivia about a
service dog.”

His
jaw drops open, and he immediately bursts into tears. “You mean it? My own
dog?”

I
nod. “They’re having an adoption day today, but I talked to her a couple weeks
ago and she’s been training someone special for you.”

He
throws his hands up in the air. “Well let’s go. What are we waiting for?”

I
laugh. “Hold on a minute there, Captain Cheerio, you’re wearing more of your
breakfast than you actually put in your mouth. Let’s get you cleaned up a
little first, and then we’ll go.”

Twenty
minutes later, I’m fixing my hair in a neat ponytail when Spence screams, “Come
on, Mamma.”

I
stare at my reflection and frown. Maybe just a slick of gloss.

“Mamma.”

“I’m
comin’, I’m comin’. Keep your pants on.” I slick a bit of Smith’s Rosebud Salve
over my lips and smooth my ponytail down again. I don’t know why I’m bothering;
all I know is there’s a good chance I’ll see Jake since he started working for
Olivia about a month back, and he’s bound to be there today.

I
know, I shouldn’t be getting all worked up or dressed up over a man I can’t
have—a man I pushed away, but it don’t make no difference. It still hurts like
hell when I run into him at the grocery store and we don’t talk past “hello”
and “see you ’round.” Hell, it hurts every time I enter my bedroom and look at
my empty bed. I swear I didn’t wash my sheets after we’d made love for a whole
two weeks because I couldn’t stand to rid the scent of him from my pillows.
Which is just wrong on so many levels.

Spence
is still walking gingerly on that leg, and despite him being keen as mustard,
it takes a few moments to get him in the car. I pull into the disabled park at
the shelter, surprised to find it still empty on what’s clearly a very busy day
for them, and we walk around the side of the building to the training yard
beyond where all the festivities are taking place.

Spencer
ignores the face painters, the jumping castle, and the clown—who I think might
be Olivia’s new love interest from Mobile, though it’s still so new I haven’t
met him yet—and makes a beeline for the doggy obstacle course. Nuke sits by the
gate, waiting patiently. He wags his tail and licks Spencer’s hand, turning
around in circles and yipping his excitement, which of course draws the
attention of his owner, who happens to be standing in the middle of the ring
running a gorgeous chocolate Lab through a newly upgraded obstacle course. His
eyes meet mine, and the butterflies in my belly flutter at full tilt.

His
gaze moves from mine to my son’s as Spencer shouts, “Hi, Jake Tucker!”

“Hey,
Spence, how you doing?”

“Guess
what, guess what?” He jumps up and down with excitement, which scares me with
his leg still being so weak from misuse. “Mamma said I can get my very own
service dog today.”

“No
way?” Jake says, coming closer to us and exiting the ring. “Guess what? This is
him. Spencer meet Sergeant Nutter Butter.”

“Get
outta town,” Spence squeals. Right away, the dog sniffs Spencer’s leg and
woofs. My son leans down and pats the dog’s big round head.

“He’s
fully trained—been working on him for several weeks. Best temperament out of
any dog I ever saw, next to Nuke, that is.” Jake scratches Nuke’s ears and the
dog closes his big brown eyes, his tongue lolling out.

“I
didn’t know you were training him,” I say.

“Yep,
picked him out, too. What do you think of the name, Spence?”

Spencer’s
eyes are huge and sparkling with excitement. “It’s awesome.”

“We
been calling him Nutters for short,” Jake says. “But he’ll answer to both.”

“Well
howdy strangers,” Olivia yells comin’ across the lawn toward us. When she’s close
enough, we hug one another. “I was wondering when we’d see you two around here.
You haven’t even come by to see all the changes we made thanks to our anonymous
donor.” She pins me with a look that says she has my number.

“It
looks incredible; y’all have done an amazing job.”

“Well,
thanks to that money and to Jake’s willingness to do free labor, we’ve made a
lot of changes around here.” Olivia squeezes my shoulders. “Thank you. We were
barely stayin’ afloat before, and now look at this place.” She stretches her
arms out wide. “Now it’s thrivin’.”

“I
don’t know why you’re thanking me,” I say, but I flush crimson from neck to
nose.

“Mm-hmm,
honey you ain’t fooling anyone.”

I
clap my hands together. “So . . . maybe we should get those papers sorted.”

“Of
course,” Olivia says. “I’m about to head into the ring to do a quick
demonstration, but I’m sure Jake would be happy to help you out with all of
that stuff, wouldn’t you, Jake?”

“Happy
to.”

Trust
Olivia to meddle
.

“Thanks,”
I say, and follow my son, whose leg seems to be doing a lot better because he’s
taken off with the two dogs up toward the office.

Jake
falls into step beside me. “You two been okay?”

“Yeah.”
I smile, but I don’t feel it. Being here with him, standing next to him and
breathing in his cologne and the scent of his sweat—it’s heady and
heartbreaking, too. “We’re getting through it. I think this will be good for
Spence. He misses Nuke a lot.”

“Nuke
misses him,” Jake says, pinning me with his stare, as if it’s my fault that
things are the way they are. The truth is this isn’t anyone’s fault. Love is
messy—it’s complicated and difficult. Sometimes it works out, and sometimes it
doesn’t.

He
clears his throat. “So, Nutters may be fully trained, but Spencer isn’t.”

I
roll my eyes. “Tell me something I don’t know.”

He
laughs. “We’re going to need to train Spence in what Nutters can do and what
he’s capable of, and sort out what we want him to work towards in the future.
He’s a therapy dog, but in the future we can train him to track, in case Spence
ever goes walkabout again. He can alert you to things like seizures as well.
Eventually, he’ll learn Spencer’s cues for meltdowns and how to assist those
before they get out of hand. But for now, we want to focus on the two of them
getting to know one another and Spence giving Nutters basic commands.”

I
stop walking and stare at him. “Did you suddenly become a professional when it
comes to autism? Do you have a degree in pediatrics I don’t know about?”

“No,
I became a qualified dog trainer.” Jake smiles, and good God does it make my
insides melt. “I’ve been working with Nutters since we rescued him. Olivia told
me who he was for. I did a little research; it’s not a big deal.”

“Actually
it is. This means a lot to me, to Spence. Thank you.”

Jake
turns to look at me. His gaze meets mine and darts away up the hill to his own
dog and my son. “You don’t get it, do you?”

“Get
what?”

“The
two of you saved my life. You’re saving possibly twenty, thirty, fifty more
with the money you donated to this place, both humans and dogs, and yet you
still don’t see how you’re deserving of someone doing something nice for you?”

I
shrug. He’s right, though I am annoyed that it was so obvious that the money
had come from me when I’d taken great pains to make it anonymous, opening a new
bank account and requesting that the check be made out to
Paws for Cause
by an unnamed donor.

Jake
shakes his head. “One day, Elle. One day I’ll show you just how grateful I am
that you came barging into my life and made me whole again.”

I
don’t have a reply for that but tears, and I do not want to shed those in front
of Jake. Not now, and not ever again. Apparently my tear ducts didn’t get that
memo, because my eyes well up and I have to blink like an epileptic hamster to
get them gone.

Not
fast enough though. Jake reaches out a hand and collects a droplet of saltwater
from off of my cheekbone. I reach up to knock his hand away, but those
butterflies in my stomach take flight again and I wind up slipping my hand
around his. I forget all about why he shouldn’t be touching me and start to
wonder if maybe he should be.

“Come
on, slow pokes,” Spencer calls to us and I glance away from Jake’s too familiar
gaze and walk up to my son, giving his new dog a pat.

Jake
follows. “So we finish up here around three. I’ll come by later and teach you
all the commands you’ll need for a day or so, but we’ll need to draw it out to
a few sessions so that Spence isn’t overwhelmed and doesn’t become impatient
with him.”

“Sure.”

“I
better get back in the ring, but if you head into the office Eloise will have
the paperwork all ready for you. I’ll see you later.”

“Jake,”
I say, stopping him from leaving. “Thank you.”

He
nods and calls Nuke to his side, walking back to the ring.

Spencer,
Nutters, and I head into the office. We’re met by a sour Eloise, who all but
throws the adoption paperwork at me. I get to work filling it in and the little
evil harpy storms out the second Olivia glides in, looking smug. “Find
everything you need?”

I
frown at my meddling best friend. “I didn’t know he’d be here today.”

“Well
sure, he’s my best trainer. All the bitches love him.” She winks at me.

I
can’t help but laugh at her. Spence laughs too, a rare treat.

My
humor all but evaporates when he starts yelling, “bitches,” over and over. He
twirls on the spot, and his dog barks and jumps about with him.

“Spencer,
no,” I say. “Sit down.”

The
dog obeys; my son doesn’t.

Olivia
goes back to ignoring his behavior, but it only gets louder.

“Give
me that,” she says, taking the paperwork from me. “You don’t need to fill that
out.”

“But
you said . . .” I trail off and glare at my friend. “You did that just so I
would talk to him didn’t you?”

She
pins me with a look and ignores the subject. “So, Jake will be by later today
to help with in-home training.”