Times and Seasons (16 page)

Everyone
had forgotten Hannah’s triumph by Thursday, when Tory returned to class. Cynthia Harrison’s year-old baby had said the word
Da-da
, and everyone was lauding him as if he’d just recited Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address. Elisa Marshall’s baby was walking as securely as any of the adults in the room, and Peg Jenkins’s baby had started crawling. Hannah still lagged behind.

When the occupational therapist met with them for their twice-a-week appointment after the class, Tory proudly demonstrated Hannah’s progress. “This is a great sign, don’t you think? I mean, don’t you think she’ll be crawling soon, now that she’s got the muscle strength to sit up?”

The OT was a woman in her fifties, built like a linebacker. Her name was Tilda, and she was compassionate and sweet to the babies, but stern and demanding with the mothers. She was trained in neurodevelopmental treatment and was never as concerned with what Hannah was doing, as much as she was with
how
she was doing it.

“I don’t really like the way she’s sitting,” she said, studying the positioning of the baby’s back, hips, and legs. “This could cause problems when she starts to crawl and walk. You need to check these joints when she sits up. Make sure her posture is right, that her legs aren’t too far apart…”

Tory’s heart rate went into overdrive. “She’s sitting, okay? That’s major progress! I’ve been working with her to do this. Can’t you say anything positive?”

Tilda’s smile seemed condescending. “I know this looks like a big step…and of course, it is. But if you don’t watch her positioning, the rest of her development could be slowed.”

Tory tried to bite back the rest of her reactions to Tilda’s instructions, and her weariness and frustration nearly brought her to tears.

But on the way home, she stewed and told herself enough was enough. She wasn’t going back to that class, and if the doctor insisted that she keep seeing Tilda, she would have to come to the house like the rest of the therapists did. Tory couldn’t stand comparing Hannah to other Down’s Syndrome babies. She couldn’t stand knowing that she was always a little behind, even in a class of children like herself. She couldn’t stand seeing the joy on the faces of the moms who saw more progress than she.

No, she and Hannah could do this alone. She would just work harder with the baby, exercise her more, spend every waking moment trying to stimulate her into talking and reaching and crawling.

If she just worked hard enough, she could make Hannah as close to normal as it was possible for her to be.

Then they would all see what a high-functioning baby she was.

The
next few days crept by for Cathy like the long, empty days following a funeral, when grief gets its foothold. Because both Rick and Annie worked afternoons, she stayed at the clinic instead of rushing home at three o’clock, as she had done when Mark was home. She tried to concentrate on the animals in her charge, but found herself calling her answering machine every fifteen minutes, just to see if Mark had used his telephone privilege to repent of his treatment of her. At lunchtime, she rushed home to check her mail, hoping he had written her a remorseful letter.

But nothing ever came.

Sunday, she decided to go back and suffer whatever abuse he had for her, but a storm of tears assaulted her in the parking lot, and she couldn’t go in. The words “scummy mother” played through her mind like a broken record, and disappointment and anger turned her back.

As she drove home, she couldn’t honestly say whether she was following Steve’s advice to teach her son respect or simply
nursing her wounds. Whatever her motives, she prayed that Mark would miss her and regret the things he’d said.

But as soon as visiting hours were over, she was sorry she hadn’t gone. She hurt for him. He must feel abandoned, forsaken. But there was nothing she could do except wait for Wednesday.

She ran purely on nervous energy, trying to get through the days without breaking down. She spent a lot of time on her knees asking God to do a mighty work in Mark, asking him to enable Mark to take the blame for his own actions, asking him to show her what she should do.

Wednesday dawned like the bright morning after a long, miserable night, and she prayed once more about whether to see him that night.

The call came at the clinic just before noon, and her receptionist answered and called her to the phone. “I think it’s Mark,” the girl whispered.

Cathy attacked the phone. “
Mark?
”

“Uh…Mom?” His voice cracked on the word.

“Honey, are you all right?”

There was a moment of silence, as if he struggled with every syllable. “Mom, I’m sorry.”

Relief flooded over her. “Mark, it’s okay.”

“I didn’t mean to be disrespectful,” he went on, as though he’d practiced the words and had to say all of them. “I was just so mad. I felt like everybody was against me, and I hated the world. I still do. But not you, Mom. I don’t hate you.”

“I know, honey,” she whispered. “I know.”

“Will you come back and see me tonight?”

“Yes, honey, I’ll be there tonight, as soon as visiting hours start.”

She could hear the relief in his voice, and she would have given anything to reach through the phone and hug him. “Thanks, Mom. I gotta go now. There’s a line waiting behind me.”

“See you later, baby,” she said. “Can I bring you anything?”

“Maybe my Bible,” he said. “The one I used at Miss Brenda’s. It’s got notes in it and stuff.”

She closed her eyes and tears pushed out. “Sure, I’ll bring you your Bible. Anything else?”

“If you can find any books you think I might like. It gets pretty boring in here during free time. And maybe some paper to write on.”

“I’ll do it, honey. I’ll bring them tonight.”

He said good-bye, and she heard the click. Then, collapsing against the wall, she held the phone against her chest for a moment. “Oh, Lord, thank you,” she whispered. She covered her face and wept.

Her spirits soared as if they were lifted by angels, and she went through the rest of the day watching her clock. She couldn’t wait to put her arms around her son again.

Annie
begged to go with Cathy that night, so Cathy acquiesced and took her along. It took her a while to get through the checkpoint with the books, Bible, and paper, but finally, she and Annie made their way to the visitation room. She would never have believed she’d be happy to see it again.

When Mark came in, she saw that his countenance had changed. The defiance was gone, and in its place was a wideeyed vulnerability that told her he was on the edge of tears. Cathy hugged him first, and he clung to her in a way that reaffirmed his remorse.

Annie got up and patted him roughly. “How’s it going, kid?” she asked.

Mark patted her back and sat down. “Okay, I guess.”

“Have you made any friends?” Cathy asked.

“Mom, he’s in jail,” Annie cut in. “It’s not like he’s the new kid in school.”

“I’ve made some friends,” Mark argued. “There are fifty of us in the same building. You’d have to be a real dork not to make any friends.”

Annie leaned up with great interest. “So what are they in for? Did anybody kill anybody?”

Mark grinned. “Yeah, there’s this kid who killed his teenaged sister.”

“Mark!” Cathy said.

But Annie laughed. “Don’t lie.” She pointed to a guy talking to his family in the corner. “Like, what’s he in for?”

“I don’t know, Annie. Probably drugs, too.”

“Anybody you know in here?” she asked.

Again, he rolled his eyes. “Yeah, Annie, three kids from my kindergarten class, and a guy from my English class last year.”

“Really?” Annie asked on a shocked whisper.

“No, not really,” he said, mocking her tone. “They’re all new faces.”

“Are any of them—”

“Nice?” Cathy butted in.

Again Mark grinned, and she could see that he was getting more comfortable in the place, that it wasn’t as much of a horror as it had been the first few days.

“Some of them haven’t tried to beat me up, if that’s what you mean.”

“Oh,” she said, trying to sound enthusiastic. “Well, good.”

His grin crept broader. “Mom, you don’t have to worry,” he said. “The guards sit up above us in this little room with glass all around it, and they watch us 24-7. If anything ever happens, they’re on us like flies at a picnic.”

“Then how come you got beat up the first week?” Annie demanded.

“Long story,” he said. “I know what not to do now.”

He sat back in his chair and looked around the room. “So, have you heard from Dad?”

Cathy exchanged looks with Annie. “No, not since court.”

“Me, neither,” he said quietly. He looked down at his clasped hands on the table. “Guess he’s pretty hot about what happened. I tried to call him yesterday, but he wouldn’t take my call.”

Cathy felt that flame rise up in her chest again. “Wouldn’t take it? Are you sure?”

“Well, they said he wasn’t there. I told them to leave him a message I had called. It probably embarrassed him.”

“Do you blame him?” Annie said, and Cathy kicked her under the table. She didn’t want any confrontations today. Nothing negative.

“So…I brought you some books,” Cathy said, changing the subject. “And your Bible, and some paper. Boy, they really check things out in here. It takes an act of congress to get them through.”

He glanced down at them, and Cathy got the impression that he didn’t care much about them. She wondered if he’d just asked for the Bible to make her feel better about things.

Annie looked at her watch and got up. “Well, I’ve got to go. I have a date picking me up.”

“What else is new?” Mark asked.

“The guy,” she said, lifting her eyebrows. “It’s Jimmy Donovan.”

He feigned shock, and she laughed. Cathy knew he was glad Annie had come. His sister leaned down and kissed his cheek. Cathy hadn’t seen that in years, and her heart jolted. “Hang in there, kiddo,” Annie said. Then she straightened. “See you later, Mom. Don’t get mugged in the parking lot.”

“Annie!”

She watched her daughter prancing out and shook her head. Then she turned back to Mark. She saw the pleasure in his eyes. Annie’s visit had done him good. “Mark, do they have chapel in here?”

“Yeah,” he said. “I went Sunday.”

Her eyes brightened. “You did?”

“Yeah. There’s no TV or anything. When we do have free time there’s nothing to do.”

“What do you do with your time?”

“Well, during the day they work us to death,” he said. “If we’re not doing schoolwork—which, by the way, is a lot worse than what Miss Brenda used to teach, and a whole lot less interesting—then they’ve got me in the hot kitchen helping with the cafeteria food.”

“That’s the job they gave you?”

“Yeah. It’s not so bad. You get to munch on snacks once in a while.”

She sat back. She should be grateful that he wasn’t out on a highway median picking up trash like she’d seen adult prisoners do.

He looked down at his hands. “Mom, I want you to know that I’m not one of those guys that’s going to keep coming back here. I’m never going to do this again. I mean it. I’m not just saying that.”

“Well, good, Mark. I hope that’s true.”

“And when I get home, I’ll appreciate my room and my privacy, and I’ll keep my clothes picked up. Really. These guards in here, they watch us constantly. You can’t burp without getting into trouble.”

“Well, be glad for the guards, Mark. They just might save your life.”

“Tell me something I don’t know,” Mark said.

Cathy leaned forward and took his hand, kissed it and squeezed it, and Mark squeezed back. Then she started telling him about some of the animals she’d recently treated at the clinic, what the score of the ball game had been the other night, and the letter they’d gotten from Sylvia and Dr. Harry.

Before she knew it, visiting time was up. Choking back tears, Mark initiated the hug this time. Cathy tried not to cry as she watched her son being taken away from her again.

When
Annie came in that night, she climbed onto the bed next to Cathy. “Feeling better, Mom?”

Cathy smiled. “I feel more relaxed than I have since this first happened.”

“Yeah, it was a good visit.”

“I’ve been thinking a lot about all this.” Cathy fluffed her pillow and sat up in bed. “About my part in Mark’s being in jail.”

“Mom, you didn’t
have
a part in Mark being in jail. You did everything you could to keep him from getting involved with those kids. It’s not your fault.”

“I know, but I still keep thinking that maybe…”

“Mom, you can’t do that to yourself. Rick and I didn’t wind up in jail, did we?”

“It’s not over yet,” Cathy said with a grin.

Annie slapped at her playfully, and Cathy laughed.

“You have to have faith in us, Mom,” Annie said. “Rick and I, we make good decisions all the time.”

“You do?” Cathy asked. “Like what?”

“Like, don’t you realize we’ve had ample opportunity to go out and get drunk on Saturday nights?”

Cathy’s stomach knotted again. She realized this conversation wasn’t going to help her stay relaxed. “I had a hunch that you might have the opportunity.”

“Well, we don’t do it. Even Rick doesn’t. I mean, most of the time he’s hanging around with some of the straightest kids in Breezewood.”

“He is?” she asked. “Really?”

“Yeah. The ones he works with at the grocery store. I mean, there are some partyers in the group, but they’re not the ones Rick hangs with.”

Cathy decided this was good news. “Well, what about you, Annie? Who do you hang with? I don’t know enough about the guys you date. And some of your girlfriends, well, I can only judge them by what I see. I don’t quite like the way they dress. But then I haven’t always been real crazy about the way
you
dress, either.”

“Big surprise,” Annie said. “But really, Mom, some of the kids I hang with are partyers, but that doesn’t mean I do it.”

“Are you ever in the car with them when they’re drinking?”

“Not if they’re driving,” Annie said.

Cathy closed her eyes, wishing her daughter had simply said no. “Honey, why do you want to be in their presence if they’re drinking? Why can’t you just hang around with people from church?”

“Well, I do a lot,” Annie said. “A lot more than I ever thought I would. I mean, you know me. A couple of years ago, I wouldn’t have gone near that place, and now some of my best friends are from there. I just don’t feel like dropping my other friends like hot potatoes. I mean, aren’t we supposed to make a difference in our world?”

“Yeah, but first I think we need to be grounded in our faith. I’m not so sure you are.”

“Well, I’m working on it, Mom. I mean, I’m better off than I used to be. All that Scripture memorizing you used to make us do.”

Cathy moaned. She was embarrasssed and ashamed that, a couple of years before, she had routinely made her children memorize Scripture when she was mad at them. Brenda had pointed out that that was no way to make them fall in love with the Bible. She hadn’t done it since.

“You know, they do make us memorize some Scripture in youth group. And it comes in handy every now and then.”

“Really, Annie?” Cathy asked. “Are you serious?”

“Sure,” she said. “When I took the SAT test I was really nervous. I thought I was going to blow it. And I started quoting to myself, ‘Peace I leave with you, my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Let not your heart be troubled and do not be afraid.’ It’s from John 14:27. Mike taught it to us in a song. I remember the tune and everything.” She sang a line of the song, and Cathy smiled.

“And then last week when all this happened with Mark and we were all so upset, I kept quoting to myself over and over, ‘Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance.’ That’s from James 1.”

Cathy’s eyes filled with tears, and she rolled over and hugged her daughter. “Annie, I can’t tell you how much this means to me.”

“Well, Mom, why do you always assume that I’m out on the street somewhere emptying beer bottles and making drug deals?”

“I don’t assume that,” Cathy said. “I have never assumed that.”

“Well, I’m just saying you should quit making yourself out to be this horrible neglectful mother who’s done everything wrong. Because apparently you’ve done a few things right. And if you had to weigh which one of the three of us you’ve done the most right with, I’d have to say it was Mark.”

Cathy sat up and looked down at her. “Why?”

“Because look what you did. The minute you saw signs of trouble, you took him out of school, got him in with Miss Brenda, and had her teaching him Scripture. And, Mom, let’s face it. Ever since you became a Christian, you’ve had us in
church every time the doors open. A person doesn’t have a chance to reject the gospel when you put it in front of us every time we turn around.”

“Oh, people have plenty of chances to reject the gospel,” she said. “Just because people are sitting in church doesn’t mean they’re Christians.”

She had been worried about Annie, because none of her children had made a profession of faith or walked down the aisle and joined the church. Yet she had seen subtle changes in both Annie and Rick.

“I know that. I’m just telling you that you’ve done a good job.”

Cathy lay back down, considering that. “Annie, have you got a personal relationship with Jesus? I mean, more than just knowing about him and quoting Scripture?”

The lamplight cast dark shadows on Annie’s face. “Well, yeah. I use it in my life, okay? I put it into practice.”

“But have you accepted Christ? Do you understand about what he did for you?”

Annie sat up and hugged her knees. “Mom, you don’t have to preach to me. I’m not Mark, okay?”

“The gospel isn’t just for Mark. It’s for you, too.”

“And I have,” she said. “One night at a youth rally. I talked to Jesus that night for the first time, and he and I have had a thing ever since.”

Cathy couldn’t have scripted a better answer. “Annie, I thought I was going to worry about you when you started college this fall, but now I know you’re going to be all right.”

Annie flopped back down and looked at the ceiling. “Oh, yeah. College.”

She had noticed a coolness in Annie’s voice whenever the subject of college came up. She had enrolled at the local community college for the fall, but Cathy knew she was looking for a way out. “Annie, why aren’t you excited about college?”

“Well, I just don’t know what I want to do yet. It seems like such a waste of time.”

“An education is never a waste of time.”

Annie slid off the bed. “Can we talk about it later? You need to sleep.”

Cathy wasn’t fooled. The college conversation could wait, but she sensed that it would be a difficult one when it came. She sat up and kissed Annie good night, then watched as her daughter left the room. She slid to her knees and whispered a prayer of tearful thanks for the night of affirmations.