Right from the Start

by Jeanie London

  “Now we eat. Then you can spin.” He met Sam’s gaze and knew his son was good with that. Will glanced at Kenzie, found her watching them with a soft expression in her eyes. “I need a place to sit him down and eat. You may regret offering to feed us.”

  “Not at all, Will,” she said genially. “Just tell me what needs to happen, and we’ll make it happen.”

  This woman might be a stranger to his private life, to Sam, but she was a compassionate one. She bridged the distance between their short professional relationship and this understanding of his family circumstances easily.

  Will knew when he saw the paper cups, plates and silverware stacked on the table in her break room that she was already prepared. She’d readied what she could in anticipation of their visit. There was three of everything, so Will guessed she planned to eat with them.

  So many people avoided dealing with Sam when they couldn’t engage him in expected ways. Not necessarily unkindness, just uncertainty, and sometimes fear. People could be scared of his son, this smart and funny boy who loved to laugh and play ball and give hugs, simply because they didn’t understand him.

  Will had taken a long time to accept that truth, the frustration, the anger, the ache.

  But Kenzie was rolling with the situation. Brave? Or naive? Will didn’t know, but he appreciated her effort as she retrieved containers from the fridge.

  “What about you, Will? I have sandwiches. Turkey? Ham? There’s still some potato salad, too.”

  “Sounds great. Turkey would be good. Although ham works, too.” Food was food. He wasn’t picky nowadays. At least until he tackled gluten-free again.

  After directing Sam to the table, Will watched Kenzie, all brisk efficiency and effortless grace as she separated plates and set out sandwiches. She stood at the sink with her back to them, red hair tumbling over her shoulders, still somewhat unfamiliar to him in her jeans and sneakers.

  “Anything to drink?” she asked.

  “Water’s good for both of us. You?”

  “Me, too.” She reached for the cups, but Will was already there, taking them to the dispenser.

  He caught a sight of her smile in profile, and decided he liked this glimpse of the woman he’d seen this weekend. Not so distant. Approachable.

  He had no idea what had changed, didn’t doubt she’d still keep him busy with her never-ending requests, but he understood that she appreciated all his work around here, enough to want to thank him however she could. Food worked. For him, and Sam.

  Setting the cups on the table, he prepared Sam’s plate, chopping chicken into thin strips with a plastic knife so they resembled the shape of the carrot sticks.

  “Anything else?” she asked.

  He shook his head, and Kenzie sat, slipping napkins beside their plates while Will tackled the backpack, forced to pull out the drill before tracking down the plastic container that protected Sam’s apple from bruising.

  “Rectangle day, buddy. First rectangles then the circle.” He held up the apple. “Sam’s on an apple kick lately,” Will explained, taking his seat. “That’s all he wants to eat.”

  “Couldn’t pick a better place to live if you like apples.”

  Will laughed. “You’re right there.”

  Hendersonville was so renowned for its apples that people came from all over to attend the annual apple festival on Labor Day weekend. Angel House’s booths were their largest fund-raiser of the year, and parents staffed booths from sunup to sundown. The booths provided everything from cultural foods to crafts. This year they were adding a 50/50 draw in the bingo tent.

  The thought occurred to Will that city council would likely make some sort of appearance with the mayor that day, too. He made a mental note to ask at the next council meeting. Advance notice was always good for arranging Sam’s care. Particularly as Will was already committed to grill in Angel House’s American booth.

  “So how’s the unpacking coming along?” he asked. “Besides the shingle, I mean.”

  Kenzie set the sandwich on her plate—she’d gone for the turkey, too—and met his gaze. “Accomplished a lot. Although I’m not close to done, I am ready to work in the morning, and that’s what I was hoping for.”

  “Looked like you had a lot of help.”

  An animated expression that dispelled some of her calm crossed her features. “Right? Any excuse for a party. I thought about hiring movers, but given the time frame I was working with...well, the thought of trying to find everything that someone else packed gave me nightmares. I’m a bit of a control freak.”

  She shrugged sheepishly as if admitting something that wasn’t readily apparent to anyone who had dealt with her and her lists and her intense attention to detail.

  “Really?” He feigned innocence.

  She eyed him as if gauging whether or not he was serious. “Just a little.”

  “Running a business, right?”

  “You know. At the end of the day, everything comes right back to you. You’re the key decision-maker.”

  “True.” He didn’t think she’d decided whether or not he was serious, but she’d latched on to his reasoning with both hands.

  Sam made quick work of the chicken but left the carrots untouched. Sliding his chair back, Will reached to the counter and grabbed a few carrots from the container. He dropped them onto his plate. “Mm, carrots. My favorite.”

  Kenzie surprised him by reaching toward his plate. “Carrots are my favorite, too. Do you mind?”

  “Help yourself.”

  She plucked up a carrot stick and nibbled appreciatively.

  Will ate a carrot, too, suddenly so grateful for her participation. He knew this feeling intimately, felt it every single time someone interacted with Sam in a positive way. Deanne. Therapists. Aides. Teachers. Guadalupe. The other parents at support group.

  People who weren’t scared of his son.

  Every positive interaction managed to dispel the weight of feeling as if he was the only one interacting positively with Sam, the only one who saw the possibility of a normal future. Will barely noticed it anymore, not like he did at first anyway, but the feeling was always there, underlying everything, most especially noticeable when he got an unexpected breather.

  Sam got the hint and was soon munching away like a rabbit. He liked carrots. Today. And they were gluten free.

  And Kenzie noticed, a smile playing around the corners of her mouth as she brought the cup to her lips and sipped.

  She made things easy, Will realized, an entirely unexpected and ironic realization about a woman who had been running him ragged with her never-ending list.

  “So tell me about my new neighbors, Will,” she said. “Angel House is a school.”

  “Yes and no. It does have a school but probably not in the sense you’re thinking of. It’s a resource center.”

  A Sanctuary for Families Facing Autism.

  “There are classes for kids and parents,” he continued, giving the layperson’s overview of services. “Angel House provides just about everything a family needs to deal with the disorder. There’s a lot involved with helping parents, a lot more than most people realize. Angel House has it all.”

  Except enough money. Angel House never had that.

  “Wow. I keep meaning to look into it for my own information, but I haven’t found the time.”

  “This came up pretty suddenly.” He gestured to the room around them.

  The delicate line of her eye
brows furrowed. “Seventy-two hours was a challenge. I’m not going to lie.”

  “Sorry about that. We’re on a time limit.”

  “You mentioned that. For the school year, right?”

  He nodded. “Can’t move the kids once the school year begins. That would be unsettling for students in a normal school setting. Angel House’s kids already have problems transitioning. And if we have to push the move back until next year, Angel House will miss out on a big, private foundation grant.”

  “Sounds important.”

  “It is.” Kenzie had no idea, and Will didn’t share exactly how important that grant was.

  Leaning back in her chair, she tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, clearly considering. “Okay, so Angel House outgrew its current location at the church. Is that right?”

  Will nodded. “And not for the first time. The program started in some empty classrooms in the grade school, but didn’t last long there. So the parish donated a house that sits on the property behind the school. That’s when it officially became known as Angel House.”

  “How does a resource center work? Do people pay for the services like private education? Is it sliding scale?”

  Will knew exactly what she was asking—to understand the relationship between the church and school and city funds.

  Back to that religious designation.

  “It’s a not-for-profit, Kenzie. The church continues to contribute to the program, since it started as a parish ministry, but Angel House has grown way beyond their means. The director is a positive genius at fund-raising. She’s the one who heard about your agency from Judge Parrish.”

  Kenzie inclined her head but her gaze flicked to Sam. “I think someone’s ready for his apple.”

  “Here you go, buddy.” Will grabbed the apple from the counter and handed it to Sam, who crunched into it, clearly content. “Good job.”

  Will removed the empty plate and tossed it in the trash before sitting down again.

  Kenzie was silent while finishing her sandwich. “So that’s why Family Foundations is so important, isn’t it? To get Angel House funding, like with that grant you mentioned?”

  He nodded.

  “And I understand Family Foundations is your brainchild. Is that right?”

  He nodded again, buying time by taking the last bites of his own sandwich. Then he cleared both their plates and tossed them. Will suspected he knew what conclusion she’d draw given the questions she’d asked during their first meeting.

  There was no sugarcoating the truth, but he found he didn’t like the idea of her thinking of him as a self-serving jerk who was using the city to further own private agenda.

  He didn’t like the idea at all.

  “You’ve got to understand, Kenzie,” he said simply and sank into the chair to wait for Sam to finish eating. “There’s a need. An impossibly huge need that even Family Foundations and Angel House combined don’t come close to touching.”

  She frowned. “The federal government provides services. I deal with families all the time that have to negotiate handling those services after a divorce. Which parent chooses the services or has the right to defer them or stop them entirely.”

  “Your dad was in title insurance, right?”

  Her gold-flecked eyes widened. “Oh, he got you, didn’t he?”

  “Enjoyed talking business.” Will forced a smile to ease up the mood. “I want you to think about gap insurance. The federal government provides services for school, from three years of age when kids can go to preschool all the way through to their early twenties when they’d normally graduate college.”

  “Where’s the gap part?”

  “What happens if a kid isn’t ready for school at three?”

  “Will, they have exceptional centers for children who need more support. That much I know because I’ve dealt with the situation in mediation.”

  “But Sam doesn’t need that kind of support. Think about it, Kenzie. Exceptional centers deal with kids who are physically and emotionally disabled. Kids who can’t function on their own or aren’t able to learn. That’s not Sam’s situation. It’s not the situation for a majority of kids with autism. They have a problem processing sensory information and language and need to be taught the things that you and I do automatically. They can learn. They simply need help and time.”

  He met Kenzie’s gaze, knew she was giving him a chance to convince her. “They don’t get that help in an exceptional center. In fact, research has proven they need to be mainstreamed with higher-functioning kids so they learn to emulate the behaviors. Sam is entirely capable of learning in a normal classroom setting. He’s a smart kid. But first we have to give him the skills he needs to get him in that classroom.”

  “So you’re saying federal services aren’t adequate?”

  “That’s exactly what I’m saying. There’s an entire population of kids who aren’t being served right now. You would be shocked to learn how long it can take to even get a child diagnosed properly. That’s where Angel House, and other places like it, fit in. Autism awareness is getting more media attention as the medical community understands more about the disorder, but until the insurance companies and government at whatever level—city, state or federal—catch up and provide services, these kids aren’t getting the help they need.”

  “Except from places like Angel House.”

  Not a question this time. Progress. “Right. Angel House provides training to help parents deal effectively with their kids. They provide access to therapists and staffing specialists and health professionals who can come up with personalized behavior plans. They help parents maneuver the system to pay for all these services that the government and health insurance doesn’t cover. They provide assistance.”

  In so many ways. Not the least of which was through support groups with other parents, so they didn’t feel isolated or despairing in those interminable times before their kids showed some discernible step in a forward direction.

  They provided hope.

  “Once Sam masters these skills and finds his language, he’ll be ready for a mainstream classroom. That’s when government services will help. That’s the gap part, and it’s a matter of time really. Kids move at their own paces, but that’s the good part. Kids keep moving. The learning never stops. They become higher and higher functioning, and they don’t ever lose anything they learn.”

  Will extended a hand to Sam. “Put the apple there. Let’s not eat the seeds. They don’t taste so good.”

  That got a smile from Kenzie. “I appreciate you helping me understand all this.”

  Will shrugged, grateful for the interruption, for a chance to check the emotions that could so easily get out of hand. This was his private agenda because the situation was personal. He needed help for his son.

  “Ready, Sam.” Grabbing the clipboard, he held out the schedule, was aware of Kenzie’s gaze on them as Sam checked off another item on the list.

  “Spin?” she asked, someone else who appreciated lists.

  “To get the wiggles out.”

  “Oh. I’ve got lots of room.”

  Will managed a smile. “Would you mind if he commandeers the studio with the unfinished floor? It’s close to where I’ll be working, and he’ll have plenty of room to run around.”

  “Of course. Come on, Sam. Right this way.” She spun lightly on her toes and headed out of the break room.

  Will caught Sam’s hand, and his smile that had felt forced came
more easily as they followed Kenzie down the hall, watching the red waves bounce on her shoulders with her light steps.

  Sam was smiling, too.

  * * *

  KENZIE THOUGHT SHE heard a noise. Leaving her office, she headed into the reception area and found Will. She hadn’t seen him in a week. As usual, he seemed to suck up all the space with his tall presence and the masculinity that was such a physical part of him no matter what role he played. Father. Handyman. Councilman. Tonight, he combined personas, dressed professionally in a business suit and carrying a toolbox.

  “Hello,” she said, surprised.

  The dimples didn’t flash in reply. In fact, the gaze he leveled her way was all disapproval. “This is a big place, Kenzie. You need a bell or something to give you a heads-up when someone comes in. I’ll bring something to hook up the next time I come.”

  He glanced at the door in question with a frown, as if debating whether or not to continue. He did. “Better yet, why don’t you lock the door when you’re here at night?”

  She nodded, embarrassed he’d called her on her oversight and appreciative of his concern. A strange blend of too much emotion for a man she hadn’t expected to see tonight. He was simply being thoughtful, she knew, a gentleman, but his concern for her felt like so much more.

  “I wasn’t thinking,” she admitted, squelching all the craziness that flared inside her at their every interaction. “I do usually lock up when I don’t have a class.”

  “Good. I know we’re in Hendersonville, but...” He let the comment trail off. He’d made his point. “So no class tonight. Now’s an okay time?”

  “For what?” she asked.

  He set the toolbox on the floor beside the coffee table. “I got your email about the outlet in the new wall.”

  Leaning against the doorway, she folded her arms over her chest and eyed him in surprise. “Wow. That’s some kind of service. I only sent that email an hour ago. It really wasn’t urgent. I’m sorry if I gave that impression.”