Once Upon a Wish (22 page)

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In June, the summer between Garrett’s third- and fourth-grade school years, Linda, Mike, Garrett, and his best friend, Travis, ventured along New Hampshire’s Kancamagus Scenic Byway and the Sawyer River below and parked at a trailhead leading to a campsite along the river.

Black, distant clouds threatened patchy blue skies overhead, but, as adventure seekers, they loaded their gear, strapped on their packs, and headed down the narrow, dusty trail. Garrett, usually so far ahead that nobody could keep up, slowed the group’s pace.

“C’mon, Bilbo,” Linda said. “You’ve gotta keep up with Frodo and the rest of us. Do you need some GORP (good ol’ raisins and grapes) or a Starburst for energy?”

Garrett shook his head, looked to the ground, smiled at his mom’s attempt to bring lands of Middle-earth, the fictional setting of his favorite book,
The Hobbit,
to life. It was a hiking ritual, a longtime family tradition, to lace imagination with reality.

“I’m so tired,” Garrett said, trailing.

Linda darted past a tree.

“Stay away from these trees, Bilbo!” she hollered playfully, continuing the fantasy. “They’ll come alive and eat you!”

“We’re going too fast,” he said.

“Stay away from those berries!” Linda yelled, pointing into the distance, to the leaves of nearby plants, bundles of invisible red berries. “They’re poisonous!”

“Mom, I’m serious,” Garrett said. “We need to slow down. This pack is too heavy.”

This was the kid who, at the age of seven, less than a year before, plunged through knee-high rivers snaking through The Narrows in Zion and hiked Walter’s Wiggles, famous for its twenty-one treacherous switchbacks as tired, breathless grown-ups turned back.

He had conquered miles and miles of trails in Moab, Utah, the sweat of 100°F dripping down his back, as he pedaled, his bike stuck in first gear, like crazy, going nowhere—and he did it all with a smile.

As a family, they had hiked all throughout New England—to Arethusa Falls and Frankenstein Cliffs, through Jewell Trail, Old Bridle Path, and the Falling Waters Trail of the White Mountains—and climbed more than 4,000 feet up Mount Lincoln, Mount Washington, and Mount Jefferson.

“Expect pain, endure pain, and don’t complain,” became the Stuart family motto when Garrett saw and memorized this quote printed on the T-shirt of a stranger during one of their trips. The bigger the challenge, the better.

Linda lifted the gear from her son’s back and divided its contents between herself, Mike, and Travis. As they continued walking slowly along the river, raindrops, falling slowly at first, then harder and faster, plopped into the cool water of the Sawyer as it flowed neatly over smooth, giant rocks. Wind tickled the leaves of towering maples, pines, and oaks as sheets of rain fell through their branches.

Mike and Linda stopped to take a picture, their clothes dry beneath protective rain gear, before continuing to the campsite to set up in the rain. Dusk was starting to settle, with the faint glow of lingering sunlight tucked behind dark clouds. Scents of wet soil rose from the ground along with the smell of rain-soaked leaves and dampened earth. The storm had sent everyone to their tents, turning
the campground into a wilderness ghost town. Far-off voices and laughter were muffled by rain, and the smoky smell of camping was faint, almost invisible. But it was there.

Where is that coming from?
Linda wondered quietly.
How did anyone light a campfire in this rain?

She peeked from her tent and saw, in the dark distance, flames of red and orange. She trekked through rain to the campsite with roaring fire and asked how fire in rain was possible.

“Birch bark,” the camper said, and when Linda told Garrett and Travis about the special wood that makes flames in spite of water, they were off.

In kindergarten, Garrett wore a cowboy hat and boots every day because, in his imagination, everywhere he went was the Wild West. He eventually traded his cowboy hat for coonskin and spent hours in his backyard pretending to be Davy Crockett. On his sixth birthday, Linda took yellow paint to a handful of rocks and buried them in the yard, where Garrett spent months digging for “gold.” Searching for fallen Birch bark with Travis was yet another adventure.

Having camped all over New Hampshire with his parents, Garrett could build a campfire with his eyes closed. Using the Birch bark as paper, he placed it into the middle of a perfect tepee of sticks and watched excited flames dance into the night, reaching for black sky.

Linda boiled water, stirred noodles, and mixed meat with sauce for their first night’s dinner. As she drained water from the noodles, she lost her grip on the strainer and a pile of hot, wet spaghetti landed in a clump on the muddy ground. She stared at it, head cocked to the side in disbelief, before letting out a belly laugh that made the others gather around.

As a group, they stared, hungry and tired, at the fallen spaghetti. With deep laughter and carefree shrugs, they dug in, sorting
through noodles untouched by dirt. As they ate dinner around the campfire, Linda’s mind trailed with the flames, thoughts hanging in the air like smoke.

Beneath the stars, sorting through and putting pieces of their lives from the last year together in her mind, Linda began to realize that something was wrong with her son. She suddenly became very aware that the curl of his wrist had nothing to do with the fall. That the funny way he had walked sometimes—with a little bounce, a slight swag—wasn’t his way of trying to be cool or silly around his friends. After watching Garrett struggle down the short, flat trail to the campsite earlier that day, she knew in her gut that something wasn’t right.

When they returned home, she immediately took Garrett to his pediatrician, who referred them to an orthopedic doctor. Throughout his fourth-grade year, Mike and Linda continued taking Garrett to different specialists, children’s hospitals, neurologists, and out-of-town pediatricians, looking for answers to the increasing contortions of their son’s body.

One doctor prescribed Ritalin to help with symptoms—body movements, impulsivity—similar to Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD), while another recommended deep muscle massage, which he tried for four painful months. They heard, “This is so strange” from one doctor and “I’ve never seen this before” from another.

After seeing more than a handful of doctors, one told Garrett that he was pushing his body too hard with physical activity, while another had the nerve to insist he was making it all up, suggesting he visit a psychologist.

“He’s too coordinated,” the doctor said after conducting a series of standard tests—taps on the knees to check reflexes, challenges
to hold his hands in place without moving—tests that Garrett had been through a dozen times.

Making it up?
Linda asked herself.

After twelve different doctors—twelve misdiagnoses—and no explanation for the increasingly strange movements of her son’s body, she let herself entertain the doctor’s diagnosis.
What if Garrett was making it up?

She let her mind dip into a dark place—
Did something traumatize him that I am unaware of? Was he hurt at some point in his life and I didn’t protect him? Was there some behavioral reason Garrett was making everything up, craving some sort of attention?

Deep down, she knew her son—knew he wouldn’t make something like this up. But even deeper down, in the quiet of her soul, she questioned it, questioned why twelve different doctors had not been able to give them a diagnosis.

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Linda, left with her own thoughts, tormented by that doctor’s words, watched as Garrett continued his life, despite his challenges. He remained hopeful and joined Vertical Dream’s rock climbing team, practicing three times a week, and asked his parents to build a rock climbing wall in their garage. They worked as a family all summer, drilling thousands of holes into plywood, placing endless climbing routes along the walls and ceiling.

Garrett spent hours on that wall, climbing, rappelling, and climbing again. He pushed himself, stretching from hold to hold, perfecting challenging angles, practicing perfect form. He gained strength with repetition, stability by climbing with a hacky sack balanced on his head—an exercise learned from competing on the climbing team—and confidence to maneuver
holds, quickly and efficiently, by playing games of tag on the wall with his friends.

Toward the end of fourth grade, Garrett competed in divisionals, hoping for a place in nationals. Climbers from all over New England gathered for the divisional competition with hopes of qualifying for nationals, and Garrett, competing against other kids his age, reached for the wall.

Mike and Linda watched from below as their son climbed with the technique of a professional, the devotion of an athlete. He stretched great distances to reach holds marked with colored tape of the courses he was following, gripped tightly to the most difficult holds—smooth and rounded “slopers”—and reached the tops of every course without falling. As he climbed, dedication dripping down the sides of his face, Linda wanted to scream, “Reach to the left! Twist to the right!”

They could see from below the exact route he should have been taking, the holds he should have been grabbing, the perfect placements for his feet. With every pause, every hesitation, Linda wanted to holler guidance, shout direction. Instead, she watched. She knew what Garrett wanted to do, knew that his body would not listen.