by A. E. Radley
“Why bring another kitten into the world, when there are so many cats needing homes?” Olivia added.
“But kittens are so cute,” Emily enthused. The truth was, she hated kittens, but she wanted to steer Henry back towards the idea of getting one rather than a cat. “You can teach them things, while cats are stuck in their ways. And older cats might just sleep all day.”
Henry’s brow furrowed as he thought about it. “Maybe,” he agreed.
Olivia looked at her with confusion, and Emily shook her head indicating that they’d have the conversation later, away from little ears.
“Olivia says I can name the cat,” Henry said. He smothered a yawn behind his hand.
Emily smirked. Olivia would live to regret that promise. Henry’s terrible naming skills were renowned. Tiny was one of the few that hadn’t been vetoed.
“I see,” Emily replied. “So, you enjoyed school?”
“Yes. I have lots of friends.”
“Someone called Dean wants to come over to play,” Olivia added. She sounded uncertain.
“That sounds like a great idea,” Emily said. Most of Henry’s current friends were much younger than he was. It wasn’t a problem now, but it would be soon.
“So, I can really get a kitten?” Henry yawned again.
Emily made eye contact with Olivia. Olivia shrugged her shoulders indicating that it was up to Emily.
“We’ll talk about it,” she promised. “Are you tired?”
He slowly nodded and stopped dead in front of her, looking up with tired eyes.
In a move perfected over the years, she slung her bag high up onto her shoulder before bending down and picking him up. He wrapped his arms around her neck and fell heavily against her.
Olivia looked apologetic. “We’ve had a busy day.”
“It’s fine.” Emily sniffed the back of his neck. She used to do the same when he was a baby, when he had a baby scent that comforted her. While that scent was now gone, he still smelt of home.
They continued walking. Emily hoped that Olivia had parked nearby. Henry was small for his age but catching up fast. She wasn’t sure she could stomach watching him grow another half an inch every time she saw him between work trips.
She looked at Olivia who walked beside them stoically. She thought back to the nervous hand-wringing and wondered if that was just nerves from being at the airport. She suspected that it was something more.
“I suppose you want a puppy?” she joked to break the ice.
Olivia shook her head. “No, it would scare the cat… kitten, I mean.”
“I was joking.”
“Oh.” Olivia nodded. “I see.”
Emily frowned. Olivia was definitely distracted. She could practically see the cogs turning.
“How’s the vegetable garden? Enough to feed the East Coast yet?”
Olivia smiled. “It’s going well, still a ways to go before I set up my own supermarket.”
Emily grinned at the joke. “Have you been in touch with Simon?”
“Yes, he’s so nervous about the baby,” Olivia said. “I told him that he’d be fine. Silly boy.”
Emily chuckled. She loved it when Briticisms slipped from Olivia’s lips so casually, a result of her extended time in the country.
“And school’s been okay?”
“A-absolutely.”
“And you’ve been okay?”
She saw Olivia tense up, clearly aware Emily had detected something was wrong.
“Y-yes,” Olivia stammered.
Now Emily was worried. Hand-wringing and stuttering. It had been a while since Olivia had exhibited those symptoms. Something was bothering her. Emily needed to tread carefully and uncover what it was.
It only took five minutes to walk to the car, but, to Emily, it felt like thirty. Henry had fallen asleep in her arms. She’d forgotten how much heavier a deadweight could be.
Olivia unlocked the car and moved the booster seat from the front to the back before placing Emily’s suitcase in the trunk.
Emily put Henry into the seat and fastened him in, placing a kiss on his forehead before taking a step back.
“I thought a cat would be a better idea than a kitten.”
Emily jumped at Olivia’s sudden and unexpected presence behind her. “Jesus, Olivia, you scared me.”
Olivia took a step back. “I’m sorry, I just… I don’t understand. What’s the difference between getting a kitten or getting a cat?”
Emily closed the car door softly. “Henry’s five—”
“Nearly six,” Olivia interrupted.
“Nearly six,” Emily agreed. “If he gets a cat, say a seven-year-old cat, and that cat lives for twelve years, it will die when he is ten. If he gets a kitten and it lives for twelve years, it will die when he is seventeen.”
“You don’t know when the cat will die,” Olivia pointed out.
“No, but based on the law of averages, a cat lives until it’s about twelve. It might die at eight, or might live to be twenty. Either way, the younger the cat is when Henry gets it, the older Henry will be when it dies. I know Henry has to learn about death at some point, but I would really rather delay that if we could.”
“I’d never thought of that,” Olivia whispered. “You’re right, of course.”
She turned away and stalked towards the driver’s door. Emily watched her go, wondering what was bothering her.
They both got in and fastened their seat belts.
“So, do we get him a kitten?” Olivia asked.
Emily considered it for a moment. “I think maybe we should. He’s the right age to take on a bit more responsibility. And he does seem to have his heart set on one.”
“I’ll do some research,” Olivia promised.
“So, everything’s good? Other than the kitten drama?”
Olivia looked at her and nodded her head. “Perfect,” she said.
Emily turned to check on Henry in the back of the car. “I think I should travel to and from the airport on my own,” she suggested. “Henry’s exhausted and you have to sit in traffic to get here. There’s no point in us all suffering.”
“But I don’t mind,” Olivia said.
“You hate being at the airport,” Emily pointed out. She’d seen Olivia’s nervous swallow at the sound of a plane landing. “It will mean being apart for another hour, but it’s better than dragging Henry all the way out here after a school day, and so close to his bedtime. I’d love to see you both as soon as possible, you know that. But this is probably for the best if we’re going to be practical about it.”
Olivia opened her mouth, presumably to argue, but thought better of it and closed it again. She nodded her agreement and put her hands on the steering wheel, preparing to drive them home.
“So, what’s going on?” Emily asked as the car started. “And don’t tell me nothing.”
14
Olivia felt the air in the car become thin. She’d hoped at least to be able to get home before telling Emily. She wondered if this marriage would last even less time than her first.
“Olivia, you’re worrying me,” her wife pressed.
She gripped the steering wheel nervously, staring out at the dark car park. She knew she had to say what she was thinking quickly, get it out in the open, like pulling off a Band-Aid.
“I’m a bad influence on Henry,” she stated. “I… I don’t think I should be the one to look after him for a prolonged period of time.”
“Is this about the wine?”
Olivia turned to face Emily. “Nicole told you?”
It wasn’t the first time that Nicole had proved untrustworthy with information. She didn’t know why she kept confiding in her. Although she had to admit that her leaks often led to positive outcomes. And sometimes she was on the receiving end of the information, so it had benefited her in the past.
“She mentioned that you were about to check yourself into Betty Ford, she was worried about you. Look, having a glass of wine, or two gulps, isn’t an issue—”<
br />
“It’s not that.”
Emily looked panicked, and Olivia knew she couldn’t put it off any longer.
“The school called me to come in and speak with them about Henry. T-they are concerned about him,” Olivia explained. She took a deep breath. “Apparently, they check children for… disorders. They have some kind of a… preliminary test.”
“Test for what?” Emily asked.
“Autism.” Olivia felt the word drop like a stone between them. “Clearly, it’s my influence. Maybe I’m catching or something. But I can’t… I can’t be the reason that Henry—”
“Hold it right there,” Emily said. She held her hand up, silencing Olivia. “Firstly, you are not infecting Henry with anything. We don’t even know if you’re on the spectrum.”
Olivia snorted a laugh. She may never have been officially tested, but she knew something was different about her. She may not admit it out loud, but she knew the truth. As much as she might like to ignore it and pretend it wasn’t there, it was.
“Olivia,” Emily said softly. She took her hand. “You haven’t made Henry this way. If, if, Henry has autism, then he has autism. We’ll do our best to get him what he needs. And he needs you. You’re not infectious, you shouldn’t think like that.”
Tears started to roll down Olivia’s face. “Maybe I haven’t infected Henry, but what about the baby? If I carry a baby, then it will have my genes. It might be like I am.”
“Good, I want nothing more than a little you.” Emily pulled her closer, and they leaned into an awkward hug, the centre console a barrier between them. “It wouldn’t matter to me, Olivia. You are who you are, I never want to change that. If you have our baby and it is like you, then I’ll be ecstatic.”
“Are you sure? I know I’m hard work,” Olivia admitted.
“You are hard work,” Emily agreed in a joking tone. “But you’re worth every second.”
Olivia sat back. She got a tissue out of her jacket pocket and started to wipe her eyes.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered.
“What did the school say, exactly?” Emily asked.
Olivia reached across into the glove box and pulled out the letter that Natalie Costa had handed to her. She gave it to Emily.
“She said that there would be further tests needed, and we’d have to consent… I’m so sorry. I should have told you on the phone, but I didn’t know what to say…”
Emily held up her hand to silence Olivia’s rambling as she read the letter.
Olivia pulled down the sun visor and peered at her reflection in the tiny mirror. She wiped away her crumbling mascara and tried to fix her hair. She’d promised herself that she would keep it together, at least until they got home. Now she was falling apart in a public parking lot, making her feel like more of a disaster than she already did.
“So, he showed some development markers in class and they asked him to do a test,” Emily recapped. “And that came back with a possibility that he might be on the spectrum and now they want to do more tests, right?”
“Yes,” Olivia said.
“Okay.” Emily folded up the letter and put it back into the glove box. “Well, I say that we let them do further tests. What do you think?”
“Me?” Olivia was floored that Emily was asking her.
“Yes, you. You’re also his parent. And you have a little more experience with this kind of thing than I do.” Emily looked at her, reading her in an instant. “I know you think you’re to blame for this, but you’re not.”
Olivia shook her head and looked away. “He was fine when I met him, and now…”
“Now what?” Emily asked. “Neither of us has detected anything. Neither of us has seen a difference in him since we got together. It’s not like you walked in, and he had a complete personality transplant.”
Olivia turned back to face her. “But it’s too much of a coincidence.”
“Millions of people are on the spectrum,” Emily said. “And diagnosis rates are shooting through the roof. Why do you think they are on the lookout for it in schools?”
Olivia shrugged.
“Do you think we should take the tests?” Emily asked again.
Olivia remembered her own schooling. She wondered if things would have been easier if someone had noticed her differences back then. She’d always considered a diagnosis as nothing more than a label, but if that label could help Henry succeed in school, in life, then surely it was an important label.
But then there was the part of Olivia that didn’t want to know. If Henry was diagnosed, would she be next? Would some scientist want to know if she had indeed infected him? Would she be the key to the scientific discovery that autism was transferrable by touch?
“Olivia.” She felt Emily’s hand on her thigh. “I can see you panicking. Take deep breaths.”
Olivia sucked in a lungful of air. The painful burn indicated that she’d been holding her breath. She nodded her head.
“He should have the tests. Maybe it will help,” Olivia agreed.
Now wasn’t the time for dramatics and ridiculousness. Now was the time for being practical.
Emily’s hand softly brushed against her thigh. “We’ll talk about it more at home.”
“I’m okay,” Olivia promised. “I just worry. Henry… he… he does things. Things that I do. He straightens things. He’s very precise about where the remote control goes.”
“Olivia, he gets that from you. As in, he copies your behaviour. It might mean nothing, he might be copying the things that you do. It’s not necessarily an indication of anything bigger.”
Olivia considered that for a moment. She knew her obsessive behaviour was considered a behavioural disorder. She liked things just so, but knew that it was more than that. If she was unable to straighten an item on a table for some reason, it riled her.
Once she’d noticed Henry doing the same, she’d started to worry. But Emily was probably right. Henry was a sponge and did enjoy copying her and helping her with tasks.
“I hope that’s the case,” she said. “I worry. I don’t want him to struggle like I have.”
Emily smiled. “I know. Let’s go home. I want to cuddle up on the sofa with my wife.”
Olivia sucked in another breath. The talk had gone better than she’d expected. Emily wasn’t angry, in fact it seemed she was quite the opposite. Sometimes it was hard to remember that she had married someone who understood her and actively worked with her. As she turned back to face the steering wheel, her eyes glanced up at the rear-view mirror and she caught a glimpse of Henry. She hoped that he would have the same luck in his life.
15
Henry entered the kitchen and looked from Emily to Olivia with a grumpy pout.
“Good morning,” Emily greeted him.
It was good to see some things never changed. Henry was just as grumpy and disoriented in the mornings as ever. He stood in the doorway in his pyjamas, with one side of his hair stuck to his head and the other side in complete disarray. He held Tiny in one hand and let out a sigh.
Olivia got up from where she had been sitting at the breakfast table and pulled out a chair for him. She crossed the room and put some bread in the toaster.
Emily remained in her seat, eager to see how things played out. Olivia had explained that Henry was still not engaging with her first thing in the morning, but at least he had stopped running away all together.
He ran across the room and nuzzled himself onto Emily’s lap. She put her arms around him and hugged him to her.
“Do you want toast?” Emily whispered to him.
He slowly nodded his head against her chest.
“And juice?” she asked.
He nodded again.
She turned to speak to Olivia, but as always Olivia was a few steps ahead. She lowered a glass of orange juice to the table.
“What do you say?” Emily prompted.
“Fanko,” Henry mumbled.
Emily could tell that Henry was going to take lo
nger than usual to wake up and start to interact, so she carried on her conversation with Olivia.
“Are you sure you don’t want to come?”
Olivia shook her head. “I have the contractor coming about the shelves. And then the electric man about the speaker system.”
Emily chuckled.
“What?” Olivia asked.
“Electric man,” Emily said.
“Well, I’m sorry, but I’m not calling him an audio and visual engineering guru. No matter what he wants to print on his business card.”
“Tell them to come back during the week?” Emily suggested.
“I can’t. The contractor is about to have a month-long vacation, and he’s the only person I trust to supply the same type of wood as my desk. Can you imagine having mismatches wood types?”
“No… I can’t…”
“And Mr Guru is busy, and I wanted to get his quote finalised as soon as possible. It’s ridiculously quiet around here.”
Emily looked around the kitchen. The dishwasher was whirring, the washing machine could be heard from the utility room, the coffee machine spluttered as it brewed its black magic. In the other room, she could hear the television.
“What are we doing today?” Henry asked. He looked up at his mother with half-closed eyes.
“We’re going to see Tom and Lucy.”
Henry’s eyes started to widen in excitement. “Really?”
“Really.”
Henry shuffled himself down from Emily’s lap and sat on his own chair.
“Can I take my badges to show Lucy?”
“Absolutely, she’d love to see them.”
Olivia placed a plate of freshly buttered and cut toast in front of Henry.
“Thank you,” he said as he lifted a triangle.
“You’re welcome,” Olivia said. She sat down and looked at Emily. “I’ll be fine on my own, you won’t be that long anyway.”
“I know,” Emily agreed. “I miss you. I want to maximise this time together. But I’ll be a big girl. I know I still have tonight.” She winked at Olivia, enjoying how the older woman’s cheeks started to colour at the insinuation.
“What’s happening tonight?” Henry asked through a mouthful of toast.
