Love Is Both Wave and Particle

by Paul Cody

  And Fall Creek was perfect in so many ways. We lived just up the hill from it, in the lower part of Cayuga Heights. It had a wonderful range of students, from faculty brats to the children of single mothers on welfare, and it was smaller than any of the other primary schools in the city, I believe. It seemed right-sized, nice-sized, and I really, really liked a lot of the teachers who had been there awhile and who were remarkably gifted and energetic and talented. Not all of them, of course, but an unusually high percentage.

  I believe it was Emily Ford, his second-grade teacher, who first brought Levon Grady to my attention. She stopped in my office after school—this would have been about ten years ago—and she said she had the most extraordinary boy in her class, with an almost equally remarkable mother. I remember she joked, You got time? And when I said, Sure, she said, Three hours?

  She told me about Levon. Tall, exceptionally bright, off the charts in all his tests, quite handsome, socially maladroit, but not clumsy, in fact, very graceful, and that was significant, because Asperger’s spectrum kids are often physically awkward. But a deep loner, only she didn’t know where the loneliness was coming from. Social or biological.

  So, she calls the mother in, Susan Grady, professor of neurobiology at Cornell, who is also quite tall and very striking, and she wants to know what the problem is. Not warm or friendly. Great kid, perfect academically, but socially isolated.

  Not surprised, Professor Grady said. His father was quite firmly on the Asperger’s scale.

  That doesn’t mean Levon is.

  Miss Ford, she said, as though looking at a spot on the wall, I am a neurobiologist. This is my field of expertise.

  Sometimes, I said to her, we get the results we expect before the experiment is finished.

  I’m aware of that predilection, but I know my boy and I know my science.

  Have you ever considered that he might be lonely? I asked.

  I have, and I’m quite certain that he’s not.

  Would you object, Emily Ford said, if Levon were to meet with the school social worker?

  Susan Grady smiled. Of course not, she said. Why should I?

  Then, Emily said, she fairly fled the room in a gust of wind, skirts and scarves flying.

  I first met Levon a week or so later, after lunch but before gym class, and I said, I’m Carrie Miller. I’m the school social worker, but I suspect you know what I do.

  He stood looking at a Japanese mask on the windowsill and a silk Japanese print on the wall. My husband and I had spent a year in Japan when our children were very young.

  Yes. You talk and help people with their problems, problems of social adjustment, and stuff like that. And you like Japan. Or Japanese things.

  I love the country, and the things.

  There was a Bashō haiku engraved on a tile:

  A flash of lightning:

  Into the gloom

  Goes the heron’s cry.

  That’s beautiful. What is it?

  A Japanese poem called a haiku. Very short. This one is by Bashō, perhaps their greatest master of haiku. It’s not only a poem, but it kind of makes you pause. Creates stillness. There’s a tiny contradiction in it. The lightning, the disappearance of the heron’s cry into the gloom. The cry and the lightning, how they become one. It stills the mind.

  He said it out loud:

  A flash of lightning:

  Into the gloom

  Goes the heron’s cry.

  Very beautiful, he said.

  Please sit down, I said. And he did, and this would be the first of many remarkable hours I spent with this remarkable boy. We met every other week for nearly three and a half years, and my gosh, what didn’t we talk about?

  We talked about books and movies and video games. We talked about the wars in the Middle East, about his teachers, and why he liked some, and didn’t like others. Mrs. Vara in fourth grade treated them like they were in first grade and was overcontrolling, but Mrs. O’Mara and Mrs. Mangino, who shared the two third-grade classes, were funny and really creative and always made things new and interesting. They were confident about themselves as teachers, and that made everything go well. And Emily Ford, who introduced us, Ms. Ford was one of the coolest. She ran marathons, and she could jump from a standing position to the top of a desk, just like that. She’d do it when she felt they weren’t paying attention or were getting sleepy-headed.

  Levon didn’t have many or any friends, but he taught Dylan, a very unpopular boy from a very sad, very broken home, to play chess, and then when he saw Keesha, another sad kid from another sad family, watching, he taught her too. Sometimes he ate lunch with them because he didn’t want them to eat by themselves, and when he saw other kids picking on them in the hallways or starting to bully them on the playground or in the gym, he always tried to defend them.

  Despite the fact that he himself was friendless, he was respected. He was very bright, and he was a big kid, and at kickball he could kick the ball out of the playground onto the street, and during fitness week each year, he did more pull-ups than anyone.

  The kid clearly had empathy, even deep empathy, and that was not something you saw in Asperger’s. So despite my better judgment, I requested an appointment with Susan Grady, I believe when Levon was in fourth grade, and we had been talking for over a year. I had grown enormously fond of him.

  She came in, and she was impressive-looking, though one was not impressed by her humility. I had googled her, and was aware of her credentials, her work in neuroscience, and the fact that she’d been made full professor in her early thirties.

  We shook hands, sat down, and she said, So you’re Carrie Miller, who I’ve been hearing such glowing reports of.

  Really, I said, and felt myself blushing.

  Levon is quite fond of you, and extremely fond of your talks. He very much looks forward to them.

  I’m so pleased to hear that. He’s quite the boy. Utterly remarkable in every way.

  I think so, she said.

  She looked at the Japanese mask, at the tile with the Bashō.

  You’ve spent time in Japan?

  My husband and children and I spent a year there years ago; it was part of his post-residency training in urology.

  Interesting. My father was a doctor too. A pathologist.

  Doctor brats, eh.

  She smiled.

  Might I ask what you wanted to see me for?

  To talk about Levon.

  Specifically.

  I find Levon to be all the usual things we say about him. Very bright, handsome, kind, thoughtful, but also quite isolated. He’s, as far as I can see, virtually friendless.

  I’m aware of that, Susan said.

  Which would indicate the possibility of his being somewhere on the very broad spectrum of Asperger’s. The very high-functioning end.

  That’s possible, but those terms don’t mean much to me. You see, his father was a graduate student, whom I had a very brief tryst with at the end of our time at the University of Chicago. He was a brilliant physicist, now a professor in the Midwest. He was probably somewhere in the middle of the spectrum. But he functions quite well within the bubble of a university.

  He has never met Levon, she added.

  So you think he inherited Asperger’s?

  I think it’s possible.

  Susan, if I may, I don’t think Levon has Asperger’s. In fact, if he were tested, I think he would fail the test.

  Why do you say that?

  He’s deeply empathic. He’s physically graceful, extremely so. With me, in our talks, there’s nothing but give and take. There’s no one-sided verbosity. There’s reciprocity. I think his symptoms are learned behavior, not inherited. He’s picked up cues from a very early age, and he’s very smart, a brilliant student, if you will. I just don’t think he’s been encouraged to be social.

  Are you suggesting that I’ve encouraged and shaped antisocial behavior?

  I think Levon is shy. I think he likes his alone time, far more t
han others.

  I paused before I continued. To be frank, yes. I think parents shape and influence their children profoundly, consciously or unconsciously, for good or bad reasons. I suspect you wanted to protect your son. You didn’t want him to be hurt, the way you imagined his father was hurt as a child.

  Ms. Miller, I am a neurobiologist. More than that, I know and love my son. I’m sure you mean well, and I’m glad you enjoy your talks with him and his time with you, but I think you’re wrong. Wrong that I would deliberately harm Levon.

  We often do what we do out of fear, out of the very best of intentions. Would you allow us to test him?

  No. Emphatically no.

  Would you think about it?

  Absolutely not. Testing is unnecessary. I know my son and I know how the brain works.

  Her gaze was so commanding, her tone so adamant, it seemed futile to press the issue.

  So I suppose you would wish that I no longer meet with him, I said.

  Why would I want that? Of course you can meet.

  And so we did. Through the end of fifth grade and his graduation from Fall Creek School. A year or two later I retired from the school system entirely. The testing had taken over, the testing of students, of teaching, the teaching to the test. The paperwork got worse and worse, and my kids were off to college by then.

  I still think of Levon, and I wonder what will become of him. He will do interesting things in this world. I think of him and his remarkable talent, and I’m reminded of the line from the British novelist E. M. Forster: Only connect.

  That, more than anything, is what I wish for Levon.

  Eighteen

  Sam

  So on Friday, on one of those lovely fall afternoons, with the trees blazing gold and yellow and orange and purple, and the sun shining like it was June or something, Levon and I happened to be leaving school at the same time, and we started walking together.

  He was walking home, and I was walking to my car, which I had parked on Lewis Street, about a half block from his house, roughly two blocks from school. We fell in step, and I asked him what he was up to that weekend, and he kind of grunted.

  Which for some reason irritated me. I wasn’t sure why except that I wouldn’t see him for three days, until Monday. I loved being around him, I was starting to realize.

  What’s ever up? he said.

  I mean, what do you do all weekend?

  He said he read, and played with computers, and slept, and did what anyone did.

  I don’t think that’s what everyone does, Levon.

  Yeah, what does everyone do?

  They see their friends, they go out, see movies, go to each other’s houses, hang out with other people.

  We reached my car, and he kept walking.

  Could we talk? I asked him, and he stopped, came back a few steps, and we stood, leaning against the car.

  You think maybe I could see you some weekend? I asked.

  I’d never have had said such a thing, but he was really irritating me, with his grunt, his lack of response, and I wanted to put him on the spot.

  See you? he said.

  Like maybe you could come over to my house, or I could come to your house, or we could go out and eat pizza or see a movie or even take a walk. You know. Something slightly normal.

  He was staring at his shoes, or at the beautiful leaves on the sidewalk.

  I thought we weren’t supposed to be normal.

  Where’s that written? I asked.

  Probably in our files.

  And that’s gospel? We’re supposed to live according to what’s written in our fucking school files?

  No, but—

  We didn’t say anything for what seemed like ten minutes, but was probably more like twenty seconds.

  Can I ask you something else? I said.

  I didn’t know where my courage came from. Maybe I’d taken an extra Ambien, but I think I wanted to break through to something else, some other level.

  Sure, he said. And I could tell he was kind of nervous. Like he wanted to run away.

  Do you trust me? I asked.

  Trust you?

  Yeah. Trust me. Or do you think I’ll hurt you or betray you?

  He looked up at the trees and telephone wires and houses.

  I trust you. I show you my writing. I’ve never done that before.

  So how about we spend a little time together outside school?

  But what would we do?

  We could maybe take a walk. That’s pretty simple.

  I’m not sure, he said. When would we do that?

  I laughed, despite myself, because it was a serious question for him.

  Any time. I could call you, or you could call me. Maybe some afternoon. Just get out of the house. Try something different. It won’t kill you.

  Saturday or Sunday? he asked.

  Does it matter?

  Maybe. Maybe not.

  I took his arm.

  I don’t want to be pushy, and I don’t want to make you uncomfortable, but I like you. I’m interested in spending time with you.

  Just then, an old lady with a little white dog on a leash turned the corner from Utica Street and started walking slowly toward us. When she was about ten feet away, she said, Lovely day, and we both said, Yes, and then she passed.

  We stood for a while and didn’t say anything, and finally Levon said, So maybe this weekend? A walk, or something regular people do.

  I’ll call, I said.

  Or I’ll call.

  Then I got in the car and started it up, and I watched him walk toward his house. Maybe I should have felt elated and relieved, and I did feel those things. But I was also shaky and scared and such a mixture of things that I wasn’t even sure what I was feeling.

  Then I got home and lay on top of my bed, and I actually started crying, with happiness and fear, and maybe wondering what in the name of God I had just done.

  Nineteen

  Meg

  The weeks were flying by, and all had been well. Then I don’t know what happened. Perhaps things were just going too well, too easily. Too many primroses in the path, rainbows in the sky, rosy sunsets. It was all just dandy, just the way I had hoped and dreamed, and two months in—boom. I got two cats in a bag, and darn, it happened fast. And I’m not sure why, or even when.

  In early fall, Sam wrote that incredible piece on Groton. Levon wrote this quite moving account of being alone on a long weekend one fall, when he was six or seven, and his mother was away at a conference up at Cornell pretty much the whole weekend, and he played video games, and fooled around on his computer, and read books. He made himself mac and cheese, and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, and he didn’t see his mother from Friday afternoon until Sunday evening, and he remembered how it rained the entire weekend, and the wind blew, and the leaves were blowing off the trees, stripping the branches, and he just didn’t know what he was doing most of the time. What was he supposed to be doing? Why was he there? In that house? On that weekend? On the earth? In time? It all seemed so stupid and useless.

  Sam said, quite fairly, I thought that he sounded lonely. That who wouldn’t be lonely?

  And he said, I’m so fucking sick of that word, lonely. I’ve heard it all my life.

  Well, I said, were you?

  No, he said.

  Sorry, Sam said.

  Don’t apologize, Levon said. No sorry needed.

  Then we were quiet.

  Oddly enough, it was November outside, and the trees were losing their leaves, but it had been unusually warm and sunny on the way into school that day.

  I mean, he said, isn’t it natural and normal to suffer, to feel pain? Isn’t that the first of the Four Noble Truths of Buddhism? To live is to suffer?

  Sure, I said. But isn’t there enough suffering already, without compounding it, making it worse? Sam in the shower at Groton, you home alone an entire rainy weekend when you’re six or seven, wondering why you even exist?

  Surely it doesn’t ha
ve to be that bad? Sam said.

  But don’t you think we make it worse by dwelling on it, picking at the scabs and scars, going over it again and again? Never getting past it? Levon said.

  He looked at us, both angry and pleading.

  You get knocked down, you pick your sorry ass up, and you move on, he continued.

  But sometimes if you never look at it, you revisit it, and repeat it and repeat it, forever and ever, I said.

  Didn’t Einstein say that insanity was doing the same thing over and over and expecting to get different results, Sam said.

  Or Plato, I said: The unexamined life is not worth living.

  You can flip those, Levon said: The unlived life is not worth examining. Or, if at first you don’t succeed, try, try again.

  Or Santayana, I believe, I said: If you forget your history, you’re doomed to repeat it.

  Again, we had a Quaker Silence.

  I’ll be honest, Levon said. This would be a lot easier if we didn’t have to meet. If we could just write our stuff, and get other people to write, and not meet.

  I know what you mean, Sam said.

  I felt almost betrayed or attacked suddenly. Like, what had I done? And Sam looked hurt.

  Would you rather not meet? I asked her.

  No, I like meeting. It’s hard, it’s pretty uncomfortable sometimes, but I always feel better afterward, for facing the fear.

  Levon? I said.

  I find it very uncomfortable. It makes me want to hide under the desk.

  Like a little kid? I said.

  He smiled. Like a little kid.

  You feel exposed?

  He nodded.

  Frightened?

  He kept nodding.

  As though we won’t think so well of you?

  Correct.

  How did you feel when you read about Levon on his rainy weekend alone, Sam? I asked.

  I wished I could have been there.

  And, Levon, when you read about Sam at Groton?

  Same thing. I hated her loneliness. I wanted to be there.