Authors: J.P. Barnaby
Aaron (22 page)
“Just. Me. And. My. Dad.,” Spencer said as he waited for Aaron to join him. Slowly, Aaron walked forward and followed his friend as Spencer unlocked the door and entered the house. The foyer was easily the size of his brother Anthony’s bedroom, and twice as grand. The polished marble floor, which seemed to go on forever, was hidden only slightly by a small oriental rug just in front of the door. Spencer stood on the rug as he removed his shoes and set them just inside the coat closet to his left. As Aaron looked around at the stylish table, huge gilded mirror, and umbrella stand that occupied the space, Spencer looked at him pointedly. Aaron furrowed his brow at Spencer’s expression, but then realized he needed to take his shoes off too. The vulnerability made him shudder inside, but he did it anyway.
Spencer took Aaron on a silent tour of his home, starting in a grand parlor room with beautiful antique furniture, through the spacious kitchen that Aaron’s mother would probably give him up for adoption to cook in, and then to his father’s study. This was probably the most impressive room Aaron had ever seen, with the floor to ceiling bookcases under glass, the huge mahogany desk, and the leather sofa along the back wall. It looked like the study of a bestselling author or a college professor. Finally, Spencer led Aaron to a rec room at the back of the huge first floor, where he found a giant flat-panel TV and a rack of video game systems. Next to the rack, he saw a variety of video game accessories, including band equipment. Aaron thought it was a really odd thing for a deaf kid to want to play, but if it made Spencer happy, it was okay with him. Aaron loved to play video games. Or at least, he had. Aaron hadn’t picked up a guitar, or even a controller in so long, he’d probably lost the ability to play.
As they walked into the room, Aaron saw a messy desk along the right-hand wall, underneath a huge bay window. The computer sat to the side of two large flat-panel monitors and a sophisticated-looking microphone. He noticed with mild surprise that there were also speakers on the desk. Spencer walked up to the desk and turned the machine on, pulling up a chair from a nearby table for Aaron. Aaron sat down and pulled his laptop out of his bag. As he did, Spencer handed him a piece of paper with a handwritten code.
SPENCER: Something eye-catching and easy to use. We can check out that control set Dr. Mayer told us about. They have some really nice free controls.
They spent the next hour structuring an interface and building the controls on screen until they both agreed on the design. It was lightweight, flexible, and visually appealing. Aaron and Spencer were both very pleased with the way their project was progressing. They would be finished far ahead of the deadline, and thought they might score extra points by actually offering the capability to download and use the program in a production environment. They were about to send their first test message from the interface when a chat window popped up on Spencer’s screen.
Aaron hesitated. He really wasn’t up for much more excitement today. He had pretty much reached his limit for new experiences and didn’t want to have to face Spencer’s dad. It seemed that Spencer understood.
SPENCER: You don’t have to. You can hang out in here and work on the program. We can eat in here too. He’ll want to meet you at some point because you’re my friend, but it doesn’t have to be today.
SPENCER: No problem. I’m not keen on meeting new people either. What do you want on your pizza? I’m sure we have sausage, pepperoni, mushrooms, green pepper, and onion. Anything else, I’ll have to scrounge for.
AARON: Sausage and pepperoni would be fantastic.
SPENCER: Okay, I’ll be back in a bit.
Aaron’s gaze followed Spencer as he left, and then traveled around the huge room. It seemed that everything a teenage boy could possibly ask for resided in this room. He moved over to the leather couch and considered turning on the gaming system, but his eyes were starting to hurt from staring at the screen for so long. Leaning back into the plush leather, he closed them for a second, trying to stave off the headache he could feel coming. The aquarium set in the wall behind the couch was massive, and the sound of water bubbling soothed Aaron’s nerves. Listening to the soft, melodious aquatic sounds, he turned, sitting sideways on the couch so he could watch the dozens of fish swimming carelessly through the predefined space. He wished he could be one of those fish, with no fear, no expectations, just swimming and eating and enjoying life.
Staring at the aquarium, he had no idea how long it had been since Spencer left the room, but he was content. The brightly colored rocks and plants that lined the bottom of the tank contrasted with the brilliant blue water. It appeared blue, at least, but Aaron was pretty sure there was a blue lining on the back of the tank and the water was actually clear. It didn’t matter. He watched as a bright yellow and white fish swam down behind one of the plants.
Then someone clamped down on his shoulder, and he screamed. His mind spiraled, and he tried to jerk away from his attacker. Falling sideways off the couch to get away from the person who wanted to hurt him, he slammed his head on the corner of the coffee table and went into a full-blown panic as blood began to pour down his face.
He heard yelling and footsteps, but the blood was on his neck. It was coming from his neck. This time he wouldn’t survive. He was going to die.
“Aaron!” a strong voice commanded. It was a voice he did not recognize. He looked up and, through the haze of the garage, saw Spencer huddled against the wall, terrified. No, that wasn’t right. He hadn’t met Spencer until after. How could he be in the garage? How could he be there while they were trying to kill him?
“Aaron, do you see what is in this room? There is a big TV, an aquarium, a desk. Do you see these things, Aaron?” the voice asked sternly. Aaron stared around wildly and wondered what kind of a question that was. Of course he could see what was in the room. “Tell me what you see.”
“Computer… guitar… couch….” Aaron choked out, confused. He just wanted to huddle into a ball, just hide until his mother came. His mother always came. But the garage had faded, and the flashback started to recede back into the vault of memories from whence it had come. He was back in the present with a T-shirt pressed against his head and a man crouched on one knee in front of him. It was the fastest Aaron had ever been able to recover from a flashback. He looked at the man, who was remarkably like Spencer. Spencer’s father didn’t have Spencer’s soft curls. In fact, his graying brown hair was cut in almost a military fashion, but his eyes were the same. They were just as warm, just as enigmatic as Spencer’s hazel eyes.
He didn’t know what to do next, so Aaron just asked simply, “How did you know?” The question asked so many different things at once. How did he know about Aaron’s flashback? How did he know what to do to help him? How did he seem to know so much about Aaron’s condition if they’d never met?
“I. Told. You. My. Dad. Was. A. Shrink.. Right.?” Spencer asked rapidly, his face reddening with guilt as he moved a little closer to where Aaron sat bleeding on the floor.
Well, that explained a few things for Aaron, but for some reason that automatic skepticism that usually came when he considered therapy or shrinks was strangely absent. Spencer’s father moved back now that Aaron was calm, and sat on the coffee table watching him.
“Can I look at the cut on your head first, and then we can talk?” he asked, pulling the T-shirt away from Aaron’s forehead. “It doesn’t look deep. Let me clean it up and put a Band-Aid or two on it. I’m going to guess you’re not too fond of hospitals or doctors?”
Aaron shook his head, amazed at the man’s insight. The problem, as Aaron saw it, was, how was Spencer’s father going to clean up his wound and bandage it without touching him? He couldn’t stand for his own mother to touch him, let alone some strange man.
“Are. You. Okay.?” Spencer asked slowly, sitting next to him on the floor as his father left the room to get what he would need to clean the cut. The concern in those soft hazel eyes touched Aaron. This guy, the one who had never met the pre-attack Aaron, had really become someone Aaron could rely on. Spencer was his first real friend.
“Thank. Me.? Why. In. The. Hell. Would. You. Thank. Me.? It. Is. My. Fault.. I. Forgot.. I. Forgot. And. I. Touched. You.. I. Was. A. Fucking. Idiot., And. You. Got. Hurt..” Spencer shook his head and then stared at the floor.
Aaron couldn’t speak to get his attention and try to argue, because Spencer wouldn’t hear him. Without thinking, Aaron put his hand on the side of Spencer’s face and tilted it up. Holding it still, he spoke again so Spencer could see him.
“You are not an idiot. I am broken, Spencer. That is not your fault. You are my friend, and you treat me like I’m normal, like I’m not a scarred freak. No one else does that for me.”
“I. Do. Not. See. The. Scars. Anymore.. All. I. See. Is. You.,” Spencer replied quietly, and continued to stand perfectly still as Aaron touched his face. Spencer’s expression was wistful, maybe, full of wonder.
The doctor came back into the room then, and without a comment about the boys’ position, sat back down on the coffee table in front of Aaron. With the presence of a third person in the room, whatever spell had been cast was broken, and Aaron sat back slowly, his mind strangely blank.
“Spence, can you hold this mirror for me?” Dr. Thomas said for Aaron’s benefit as he signed to his son. Aaron could only imagine he did it out of habit, saying what he signed aloud. Spencer took the mirror from his father and held it up in front of Aaron.
“Okay, Aaron, I want you to take the peroxide and clean the area around the wound. Then I’m going to have you put on this gauze and tape,” Dr. Thomas said, folding a piece of white gauze into a smaller square, maybe two inches by three inches, and applying medical tape to either end.
Aaron looked in the mirror, momentarily panicky because of the blood he saw on his face. Then he looked up into Spencer’s face, and his friend smiled down at him, and he did what Dr. Thomas asked. It took just a few minutes before the cut was bandaged and Spencer’s father was putting away the supplies. He came back into the room and sat back down, not on the coffee table this time, but in a leather chair farther away from Aaron. Aaron continued to sit in a small ball on the floor, his knees pulled up to his chest. Spencer had moved to sit on the couch next to him, careful not to touch.
“To answer your question, Aaron, I had the idea how to help you because I am a clinical psychologist that specializes in severe stress disorders. The method I used with you was called grounding. By grounding you in the room and in the present, it helps to keep you from slipping into your traumatic memories when they are triggered,” Spencer’s father said, settling back into the plush leather and crossing his long legs.
Aaron studied him for several minutes before responding. He took in the relaxed manner, the man’s steady confidence. It seemed he knew everything there was to know about Aaron, or….
“You think you can help me?” Aaron asked quietly. They all thought they could help him. Every shrink his parents had sent him to thought they could help him, but they were wrong. The hope that had been building in his chest started to deflate, because Aaron really wished someone could help him. He was really starting to get sick of being broken.
Aaron looked up at that, meeting the man’s gaze. He rarely looked anyone in the eye, but the answer was just so unexpected. What the hell did that mean, he could help Aaron help himself? Wasn’t Spencer’s father the shrink? How could Aaron fix himself, and if he could, why hadn’t he done it already?
“It means that I can teach you coping mechanisms, relaxation techniques, and other ways to deal with your trauma. You are never going to be the boy you were before you were attacked, but….”
“How do you know what happened to me?” Aaron demanded. He could feel the anger, the uncontrolled rage building inside him, and for no good reason. Spencer’s father could have read it in the paper or seen it on the news. There weren’t many people around here who didn’t know who he was—poor little Aaron Downing. The room was suddenly warmer, and his heart beat wildly in his chest, fueled by the adrenaline. Aaron could almost feel his face flushing with anger, but before he could really build up a head of steam, Spencer’s father cut him off.
“Spencer told me what you had told him because he wanted to know if there was anything he could do to make things easier, being your friend. He cares very much about you. I dug up the press clippings and other things that I could find about your case because, like today, I wanted to be able to help you if my help was warranted.”
He was calm and controlled, and Aaron could feel his anger deflate. Apparently, Dr. Thomas knew that trying to placate him would only make him angrier. The calm, detached, unemotional explanation was so much
