Pathway to Tomorrow (21 page)

“Now it’s clearing up time,” Jodie said. He stared at her.

“Mrs. Cotton clears up.”

“Well Mrs. Cotton’s not here right now. She’s gone out, so you’ll have to do it Luke.”

He shook his head. “Mrs. Cotton always clears up.”

She sighed, wondering anew how Marcus could have allowed him to reach the age of eleven with no sense of responsibility at all. She’d worked with children for far too long to accept his disability as an excuse. Luke was bright and he liked to learn, so if she could teach less able children to care for the horses they rode, then she was sure Luke could learn to clear up after himself. Immediately she castigated herself for having such uncharitable thoughts while Marcus was sitting with his dying dog. Now was not the time to push Luke either. He was going to have a hard enough time coping with Blue’s death. She knew he and the old dog were exactly the same age, so now, as well as having to get used to a new home, he was going to have to cope with losing one of the lynchpins of his life. She wondered if anyone had ever talked to him about Blue and told him that because he was very old, he was going to die.

Taking a deep breath, she smiled at him. “Well we’ll leave it for Mrs. Cotton this time then. Let’s go indoors now?”

He followed her into the kitchen where Marcus was still sitting beside Blue gently rubbing the old dog’s head. He frowned when he saw Luke.

“He shouldn’t be here. It will just upset him.”

“So will discovering Blue has gone but without knowing why.”

He glared at her. “I don’t want him here when the vet comes.”

“He won’t be, but he has to understand what’s happening, even if it causes problems. Blue has been part of his life ever since he was born so you can’t let him just disappear with no explanation.”

“Where is Blue going?” Luke’s question sliced through their conversation as he walked across to where the old dog was lying. His eyes were closed now but when he heard Luke’s voice they slatted open. For a long moment the boy and the dog looked at one another. Then Blue gave an enormous sigh and stopped breathing.

* * *

Much later, after Marcus had vented the worst of his grief by digging a deep hole at the end of the garden and laying Blue’s body in it, he sat at the kitchen counter with his head resting on one hand. Jodie pushed a mug towards him.

“Drink your coffee while I check on Luke.”

He didn’t answer but when she moved past him he put out his free hand and pulled her to him. With a sob she wrapped her arms around him and they clung together for a long moment. Then she gently but firmly extricated herself, knowing Izzie and Luke needed her more.

They were sitting together watching a wildlife DVD. Izzie’s eyes were red but Luke was too intent on what was happening on the screen to notice when Jodie joined them. Sitting beside Izzie she raised a questioning eyebrow.

“He doesn’t seem to care,” Izzie whispered. “He hasn’t said anything at all about Blue even though he knows he’s dead. All he’s worried about is whether Mrs. Cotton will be back in time to cook his lunch.”

Jodie shook her head. “Because he doesn’t experience things the same as other people he might never grieve for him, or it might happen next week, next month, or even next year, and that’s something Marcus is going to find really hard to deal with.”

* * *

It proved to be harder than she’d anticipated because once Luke had accepted Blue was dead he spent all his time talking about him, and about what had happened to him when he died. Within a few days an obsession with death had replaced his interest in birds and he spent all his time drawing and labeling animal skeletons. Unable to cope with it, and with his incessant questions, Marcus retreated into his studio, only reappearing at the end of each day a few minutes before Luke’s bedtime.

Izzie spent a lot of time in the studio as well, preparing for her first public performance. She came home each night though but to Jodie’s dismay she began to leave her bedroom door wide open again. She lost weight too, and there were permanent shadows under her eyes.

At her wit’s end, Jodie divided her time between her work at the riding school and Luke, Marcus and Izzie, in the forlorn hope things would soon revert to something more manageable.

She visited Luke at the end of every day while Marcus was still in the studio. She looked at his drawings and answered his incessant questions, she talked to Mrs. Cotton about how best to distract him, and she tried to persuade him to say hello to Buckmaster again.  He wouldn’t though, even though he knew the big chestnut horse was waiting patiently outside. He wouldn’t even talk about him. Every time Jodie mentioned his name he clapped his hands over his ears and started making an irritating clicking noise with his tongue.

Finally, she had had enough, and instead of waiting for Marcus to leave the studio and come up to the house to see her, like he did every evening, she went to find him instead. The sound that washed over her as she pushed open the door made the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. She had never heard music like it. Every note was a cry of pain, every phrase the memory of a broken heart. Silently she slipped into the studio and sat on the floor just inside the door. By the time Marcus saw her, her cheeks were wet with tears; tears for him, for Luke, for Blue, for Izzie, and for her own lost dreams. With an exclamation of disgust he banged down the lid of the piano and hurried across to where she was crouching against the wall. Gathering her in his arms he rocked her to and fro.

“Please don’t cry Jodie. I know I’ve been impossible and I’m sorry. I know I should be better at dealing with Luke but he makes me so angry that the only way I can stop myself from shaking him is to stay in the studio.”

Burying her face in his shoulder she shook her head. “I wasn’t crying about you…I…it was that piece you were playing… it turned me inside out. My nerve endings are all on the outside now, along with every painful memory and every tear I’ve ever shed.”

He brushed her hair with his lips. “It’s the only way I know to make sense of things. Instead of thinking about other people and about how they feel, all I want to do is shut myself in the studio and turn my own feelings into music.”

Tilting her head back she gave him a watery smile. “Anyone listening to the piece you’ve just played will know you feel exactly like they do and they’ll forgive you.”

Without answering he kissed her, licking at the salt of her tears with his tongue before probing lower to where her mouth was waiting. Within moments they had forgotten everything but their need for one another and when Marcus swept her up into his arms and carried her across to the huge couch that took up half of one wall, Jodie clung to him as if she were drowning.

He untangled her arms with a groan. “Let me lock the door.”

By the time he turned back to where she was sitting she had shed her fleece and polo shirt and was tugging at her jodhpurs.

* * *

Later, sprawled across his chest, Jodie looked at Marcus. The strain had gone from his face but he still looked tired and miserable. She ran her fingertips across the bow of his lips and then smiled as a shudder went through him. He saw her expression and grinned at her.

“Witch!”

“I wish,” she rolled away from him. “If I were a witch I would be able to put everything right with a magic potion.”

“You do that already for me. You enchanted me when I first met you and I’m still under your spell.”

“That’s not what I meant and you know it. Stop flirting with me and be serious.”

He turned his head to look at her, reveling in the purity of her profile and the tangle of her hair even as he answered. “I’m not flirting. I mean it Jodie. And if you want to be serious, how about agreeing to marry me now you know everything about me, warts and all?”

She sighed. “Not that sort of serious…the how do we help Luke and Izzie sort of serious.”

He frowned and then propped himself up on the couch and wedged a cushion under his head. “What’s wrong with Izzie? I thought the therapy was working.”

Squirming around to face him, she shrugged. “It was but now it’s not. She hasn’t been the same ever since Blue died.”

“Nor have any of us, but surely it doesn’t mean her old problems have come back.”

“It does when she starts to leave her bedroom door wide open again every night, and when she barely raises a smile even when she’s talking about music. And she’s hardly been to see Luke at all.”

“Well you can’t blame her for that, not if she’s feeling down. Who wants to spend all their time talking about death and dying, and what happens to bodies when they’re dead?”

“Luke does, and that’s what I mean about being serious Marcus. He needs to work this out of his system before it becomes a total obsession, but he can’t do it without you.”

“Me? You and Izzie get far more out of him in five minutes than I do in a day. No, I’m not the person you need for this.”

Wriggling around even further, she faced him. “That’s where you’re wrong. Luke is behaving like he is because of you. He doesn’t understand grief. Although he knows Blue has died it doesn’t mean he understands why everyone is sad. He just knows it has something to do with dying and he’s trying to make sense of it.”

“And you’re such an expert because…?”

“Because I took the trouble to ask an expert about it,” Jodie’s face was full of sudden fury as she answered him.

“An expert who knows more than Mrs. Cotton or the other people who care for him every day?”

“Yes! A real expert Marcus! Someone who is trained to help children with autism and who understands what Luke is going through. Mrs. Cotton is a lovely lady but she’s not enough for him. Nor
is the team of people who keep him tethered to his routine. You’ve spent a fortune bringing most of them up here with you just to keep him happy when what he actually needs are challenges, lots of challenges. He also needs his father to help him cope with them, whereas at the moment all he’s got is someone who doesn’t want him around at all.”

“Well I’m sorry to be such a disappointment but I’ve been there and tried that, and it didn’t work.” Marcus swung his legs off the couch and reached for his jeans. Then he started to laugh.

Jodie scowled at him. “What’s so funny?”

“You are…we are...discussing this while we’re both stark naked. This is not exactly pillow talk is it?”

It only took a moment for Jodie’s scowl to slip and then disappear and soon she was sitting on his lap, her arms twined around his neck, her lips whispering across his cheek. “I’m sorry. You’re right, this isn’t the time, but we do have to talk about it Marcus. Luke needs help. Izzie needs help. We all do.”

He tightened his arms around her. “Okay, you win. I promise to talk about it…bu
t…not…right…now.” He punctuated each word with a kiss and soon Izzie and Luke had been forgotten again.

Chapter Twenty-six

Marcus was as good as his word. The next day he was waiting for Jodie, and when she went in search of Luke he followed her,
and then mirrored her behavior. He admired the pictures of the skeletons that were threatening to overwhelm his son’s sitting room, and then listened to his non-stop commentary about death. Finally, when Luke paused for breath, he spoke to him.

“Do you remember what happened when Blue died Luke?”

“You buried him.”

“Yes. I buried him in the garden. Do you know why I did that?”

“So he won’t go away.”

“No. He’s dead Luke. He can’t go anywhere. I buried him in the garden so I can remember him. I can sit by his grave and think about him whenever I want to.”

“What happens when a dead body is buried Luke?” Jodie shook her head as she interrupted. This wasn’t what Luke needed. It was too fanciful for a child who only dealt in facts.

To Marcus’s distress, his son immediately went into graphic detail about decomposition, but when he started to protest Jodie grabbed his hand and squeezed it hard. With enormous difficulty he took his cue from her and swallowed his words as he waited for Luke to finish. Eventually Jodie slipped a question into the tiny pauses between his son’s words.

“And what else happens when a body decomposes Luke?”

He stared at her. “It feeds the worms and the insects.”

Ignoring the pained expression on Marcus’ face, she nodded. “And that makes them fat and healthy, just the way the birds like them. Is that what Blue’s body is doing Luke?”

His eyes opened wide as comprehension dawned. Then he turned to Marcus with a beaming smile. “Blue is feeding the birds.”

* * *

“That was very painful,” Marcus walked her out to where Buckmaster was waiting.

Jodie twined her fingers with his. “I know, and you’ll probably have to go through it all again tomorrow, but it’s a start. It’ll get easier I promise.”

“I guess I need to spend some time with your expert.”