A/N-Okay, so we definitely deleted that “this whole thing is an author’s note” thingy from the top of the document we normally

Author’s Note: Apparently these things hate us.

The first weeks without the medication and the doctors were rough. Avery was staying in Alistair’s room and there wasn’t a single night anyone slept. Ariella and I put him in bed and for a few hours everything was quiet. Avery was normally asleep or sitting up with his headphones on and his head in a book. I often wondered how he functioned with the little sleep he got those weeks. I was up as well, in my office, pouring over books on schizophrenia or watching A Beautiful Mind, trying to figure out how someone could survive without the medication like clozapine or another anti-psychotic. I resented that name by then: anti-psychotic. I knew Alistair was anything but psychotic. He was just sick.

After those few hours of silence there would be a soft whimpering and the click of Avery’s light come on. Then the screams started. They were frantic, desperate, panicked screams and then there was the struggle as Avery pinned Alistair down to keep him from clawing himself across the room and getting hurt. It was about that time that I stood up and Ariella came out of our bedroom, bleary eyed and stumbling drunkenly. I opened the door for her and she gathered Alistair up as Avery let him go. He cried then, gut wrenching sobs as he clung to her like she was the only thing keeping him from being carried off into space. It was at that point that Avery’s headphones went back in full-blast and he burrowed under his pillows.

During the day, when I had Alistair (because his elementary school refused to accept him back until he was able to control himself) I tried to teach him. We learned from each other. I knew his hallucinations as if they were my own and I tried to instill in him a sense of reality. Zoe was not real, but Rob was. The desk was real, the car was not. No one is speaking to you, Alistair but Mozart is playing. There were days when he would walk through my office, his hand playing over the surfaces and his eyes trained on me as if he were questioning me. Is this real? I would nod or shake my head, depending on the answer.

When the high school let out, Avery lugged himself and his overly stuffed book bag to my office three blocks down. From there, he would sit in my miniscule waiting room with his head tucked in an assignment and Alistair sitting at his feet. There was one occasion where he was in Avery’s lap, holding the book as he read and listening. It was a T.S. Eliot anthology. Jess was sitting across the room, her wraith’s body bent over and her elbows on her knees. She was watching them and I found myself staring as well. There was something in Avery that Alistair needed and I had not yet figured it out but it was presenting itself again. It was an understanding. While Avery preferred to dominate the world around him and pretend that nothing was wrong to hide what he was actually doing, Alistair displayed his shortcomings because he had no other choice. He grew nervous when he saw things he knew were not there and even more nervous when he was meeting someone. Sometimes he pulled Avery’s sleeve to make sure the person was really there.

“We have lingered in the chambers of the sea, by sea-girls wreathed in seaweed red and brown, till human voices wake us and we drown,” Avery finished. It was The Love song of J. Alfred Prufrock, a poem depicting a man hiding from the world because of his incapable tendencies.

“Are mermaids real, Avery?” Alistair asked, closing the book in his lap and turning to face his new older brother.

Avery sighed. With any other seven-year-old it would have been kind to let him believe whatever he wanted but fantasy and reality had to be a definite black and white for Alistair. “I think he was trying to use the mermaids as a symbol for an escape from reality,” he explained. “They aren’t real.”

“Oh…” Alistair was put down but he opened the book randomly. “How about this one?”

“Dolce et decorum est?” The older leaned over and raised his eyebrow. “I think this might be beyond you and a little bit scary for you, Alistair.”

Jess stood up then, noticing me, and she walked out, tousling Avery’s hair as she left. He looked up at her, wide-eyed at her contact and then, after a fleeting look of terror, relaxed. “I’ll see you later,” he said quickly. She nodded and entered my office.

I clicked the door shut behind us and looked at the chart on my desk. She had gained weight. She had been progressively increasing with Avery’s intervention. I was pleased, to say the least. “Very good, Jessica. I’m very proud of you.”

Jess sat down and as if to make a point, she tugged a lollipop from her pocket and popped it into her mouth. “You know I’m going to prom with Avery?” she asked nonchalantly.

I’m sure I blanched. I dropped the file I was holding on the desk and had to physically shake my head to clear the thoughts. Finally, I managed, “This isn’t about Avery, Jessica. How are you feeling?”

“This is very much about Avery, Dorian. I feel happy and I feel like I belong in my own skin and it’s because of him. What happened that made him so…different?”

“How is he different?”
Jess raised an eyebrow. “Well, number one, you adopted him. Number two, he was your patient which generally means there is something wrong up here.” She tapped her head. “And number three, look at how Alistair responds to him. Most boys Avery’s age would shrug him off as annoying but Avery takes time to help him. He’s closer to a little boy than he is to anyone his own age. That’s a little bit abnormal. Why?”

I sat back and folded my hands. This was certainly a predicament. Obviously I was no longer Avery’s psychologist but he spoke to me on a regular basis and was making progress around Ariella. As his father, I was permitted to give Jess the information she asked for but at the same time that would be betraying Avery’s trust. I was caught. “Jess,” I started, leaning forward and resting my head in my hands. “I think that’s something you need to ask him yourself.”

“I did.”

I was surprised and for a moment I just watched her. She was staring at me with hollow darkened eyes framed in black lashes. “And what did he say?” I asked.

“I thought you said this wasn’t about Avery.” She grinned then, popped the candy back into her mouth, and crossed her arms.

“You brought him up, if I remember correctly.”

“If you have to know, he didn’t answer me. He just changed the subject.” She ran the lollipop over her lips, rubbed them together and stained the skin red, and then sucked on it again.

“Then he isn’t ready to talk about it. Give him time, Jess. When he tells you, you’ll understand why he put it off.”

Jessica shrugged and crunched down on the candy but left the stick in her mouth to chew on. She did so thoughtfully for several seconds and then sighed. “He has a gift for seeing what’s underneath people.”

“I know he does.”

“So do you.”

I laughed and flipped her file open to start adding notes. “Well, that’s what I went to school for, right? What kind of shrink would I be if I couldn’t see people for what they really are?”

Jess giggled. “That’s a good point.”

“I don’t mean to bring up a sore subject but…you’ve added some weight.” I couldn’t say gained weight or put on weight or even mention the word pounds because it often made Jess cry and set her treatment back. After several attempts at finding a way to explain to her in a comfortable manner, we came up with ‘added weight.’

She nodded slowly and thought again for a bit. Jess had a tendency to think very long before she ever said something. Avery had mentioned it several times. “Talk about not jumping into the frying pan,” he had said. She was still crunching on the candy and when she opened her mouth I could smell cherries. “Avery hugged me once,” she said suddenly. “And he said he thought he could break me in half. He didn’t like it.”

“You’re supposed to do this for you, not for Avery.” Always back to Avery, right? Always.

“I am doing it for me. I went home that night and realized how disgusting I looked like that. Now, I’m not keen on becoming the next thousand pound woman but curves aren’t a bad thing. I’ll look good in a bathing suit and a prom dress.”

I winced at the mention of prom again. Avery had not said a word about attending, at least not to me. I wondered if Ariella knew. She worked at the school. She was bound to know prom was approaching it should have occurred to her to ask him about it or at least mention it to me. “Well, I think it is an excellent decision on your part, Jess. I’m just a little bit concerned about you being so…close…to Avery.” I was, of course, recalling the incident in his file and the girl he’d overturned a table on.

Jess raised an eyebrow delicately and looked at me as if she expected an answer. It reminded me very much of Ellie, my stepmother. She used to stare at me, with her arms crossed, her foot tapping, expecting some divine explanation for whatever stupid thing I had done. “Oh? Why is that?”

“You don’t ask questions,” I recovered quickly. “I do. You just answer them. I’m only concerned because, as you know, Avery does have some problems. If he doesn’t feel comfortable talking to you about them then that’s his prerogative. I can’t reveal his secrets.”

The buzzer on my desk rang, signaling the end of the session and the last appointment of my day. I stood up, nodded to Jess as she walked out, and dropped the files I’d been working on that day into my briefcase. I wondered what had gotten into Avery. I never went to my proms. They were dangerous. Too many women rubbing against me and much too close for any form of comfort. Ariella had gone with Talos her senior year. I remembered that. She liked dancing. I hated it. I hated social contact then in general. He had a similar phobia to women. Little to no contact made him happy. Anything more than that and he had flashbacks. I knew that feeling.

There were, however, things that were different about Avery and I. He had lasted much longer in that situation. Longer than anyone should have. A teenage boy…I had been twelve, he was sixteen when they removed him. He had a tolerance I lacked. An acceptance of what he was. As a child, I had been unable to understand what was happening and my reactions had been of pure terror. Avery’s were of raw, uncharted hatred. He knew. He understood. He grasped the knowledge of what was being done to him and yet, he had done nothing. He couldn’t. He was a puppet like I had been.

The door opened, interrupting my thoughts and Avery came in. He tossed me the car keys and watched. He expected me to gather up my things quickly and follow him out as I usually did. I put the keys on the desk and he shut the door behind him. “You’re upset,” he whispered.

“No, I’m not. I’m a little bit confused,” I admitted. “You didn’t tell me about prom, Avery.”

“I didn’t…think it mattered,” he mumbled, dropping the book bag he was holding. “It’s just a stupid dance, right?”

“There will be girls there, Avery. And Jess will…she’s going to touch you. Have you ever been to a high school dance?”

He shook his head and sat down, swallowing hard. He was looking at me expectantly. He wanted me to tell him what a high school dance was like and for a moment, I only stared back. I didn’t know but since high school I’d been to clubs. I had also seen Ariella’s prom pictures. I ran my fingers through my hair and sighed. “Uh…look, there’s going to be a lot of people all around you. They press in on you, it’s suffocating and everyone is moving. Everyone is touching. You’re not going to be able to escape that and there won’t even be room to throw any table over. And Avery…dancing now is like…” I hesitated and tried to think of a way to describe the gyrating, rubbing, sweaty thing that was a high school dance. “It’s like having sex without taking your clothes off.”

He paled visibly and sat back in the chair, his hands wringing in his lap. “Shit,” he said almost inaudibly. “I didn’t…” He was panicking. I hadn’t seen him like this in quite some time. He had brief moments of panic. Nothing as terror stricken as this. His eyes were wide and his cheeks had gone whiter than bed sheets.

“Avery, keep breathing. It’s okay. We’re going to figure it out,” I said calmly, moving around the desk and kneeling beside his chair. He was hyperventilating and behind us, the door opened again. Alistair peeked in, took one look at Avery, and walked back out.

Avery sucked in a large breath and held it, his lips pressed together tightly and his eyes shut. Then he exhaled, stood up, and nodded. “I’ll be fine,” he promised. “I have to get over this some time. Sooner is better than later…”

“Sometimes sooner isn’t possible,” I mumbled, grabbing my briefcase as he walked out the door. He didn’t hear me, or if he did, he didn’t mention it. He just took Alistair’s hand and we walked to the car.

“Are you okay?” the little boy asked, looking up.

Avery shrugged and offered a smile. “I’m fine. Get in the car and buckle yourself in.”

Alistair did as he was told and Avery slung his backpack into the seat beside the booster. Then he climbed up front. I slid in beside him and decided that the best way to do this was to make it fun for him. If he enjoyed the lead up to prom maybe he would enjoy prom itself. “So, what color is Jessica wearing?” I asked, staring the car.

“It’s like a mango color. It’s really different,” he answered, pulling a book out of his pocket.

“Ariella is good at that kind of thing. She’ll help you out with a match if you ask her.”

Avery nodded but he was clearly not interested in the subject. I doubted he was even reading. His eyes didn’t move, only stayed rooted to one spot on the page the entire drive home. In the back, Alistair wiggled uncomfortably in the silence and scrambled out of the car when I parked. He was dragging his things and Avery’s backpack, lugging them into the house. Avery pocketed the book, his eyes on the ground, and climbed out. He slipped into the house quickly.

Ariella was already there and when Avery passed through the kitchen to the basement she turned around to hand him something but he brushed past her and dodged down into the door of his sanctuary. It slammed shut and her eyes moved to me. “What happened?”

“Apparently he’s going to prom…and he discovered what it is.”

“Oh…should I talk to him?”

“I wouldn’t. Let him come to you. I think he needs some time.”

As it would turn out, he needed a lot of time. He didn’t speak the rest of the day and didn’t come up for dinner. It was unlike Avery and Alistair was itching to go downstairs and confront him. I held that off, warning him that Avery wasn’t feeling himself that day. Alistair sulked and turned his music up the whole way in his room. Avery’s response was to crank his up equally. It became a battle of sounds and I wondered what had prompted it. Avery probably knew Alistair was upset and this was retaliation against it. On one side of the house Bach reigned supreme and on the other side Jack’s Mannequin blared a response.

After several hours of this, Alistair consigned and the music went down until Ariella put him in bed. We left Avery in his room and I didn’t worry about him until Ariella went to bed herself. Then I began to wonder what he could possibly be doing in the basement. The music had stopped hours before, just run out.

I put down the Ahmadi file and took the stairs to the basement. All that had been moved up to Alistair’s room was the bed. All of Avery’s things, confiscated from his house when his mother had gone to prison, were there.

He was on the floor in the middle of the room, his head on his arms. He was asleep on top of a photo album and his cheeks were raw. He’d been crying then and I cursed myself for not going down there sooner. I sat beside him and the album slid out from under his hands smoothly. It was a birthday party, clearly before his father died. He was turning four then and one of his front teeth were missing. He was laughing and the people around him were singing. I remembered things like that from my childhood and how painful it had been to miss them.

I closed the book and returned it to his shelf. His eyes opened slightly and he watched me blearily for a long moment before his senses returned and he sat up. “What time is it?” he croaked, mussing his hair.

“Time for you to go upstairs and go to bed,” I answered, standing and offering him a hand. He stumbled to his feet, rubbing his face. I knew that feeling well enough. His eyes were probably itchy from crying and his skin probably felt tight from the salt in his tears.

“Sorry about today,” he whispered, tripping over himself toward the steps and then nearly crawling up them.

“No apology necessary. I understand.”

He shoved the door open and then tottered down the hall just as Alistair’s whimpering started. Avery didn’t even stop at the door. He continued on to the bathroom and I heard the hot water start. Alistair was screaming by then and I entered his room, gathered him up, and took him to sleep in our room. Avery needed a break. I knew it when he’d fallen apart that afternoon. Something was cracking in him and I couldn’t tell if it was a good thing or a bad thing. Was it the wall he’d built around himself or was it his resilience to problems?

Alistair’s arms wrapped around my neck and he sobbed as I put him down next to Ariella. She rolled over, half-asleep, and tugged him into her embrace where he quieted instantly. I always marveled at the effect of mothers. Mine had never been like that so having Zoe and Alistair had been an eye opener for me. They always ran to Mother before they ran to me. She had the healing touch and the soft hands that little kids needed.

My heart trembled at the thought of Zoe and I remembered her first years and how she’d snuck into our room and cuddled up against us. I recalled sitting on the edge of her bed at night watching her sleep, afraid she would disappear if I didn’t keep my eyes on her all the time. I should have kept watching. Maybe I would have seen that car.