But it doesn't hurt. Not nearly as much as the rest.
"You have to expect some regression," Dr. Robichaud says quietly, as we both watch Nathaniel lie listlessly on his stomach on the carpet of the playroom. "His family is coming apart; in his mind, he's responsible for it."
"He ran to his father," I say. "You should have seen it." "Nina, you know better than most people that doesn't prove Caleb's innocent. Kids in that situation believe they've got a special bond with the parent.
Nathaniel running to him-that's textbook behavior.
Or maybe, I let myself think, Caleb did nothing wrong. But I push the doubt away, because I am on Nathaniel's side now. "So what do I do?"
"Absolutely nothing. You keep being the mother you always have been. The more Nathaniel understands that parts of his life are going to remain the same, the more quickly he'll overcome the changes."
I bite my lip. It is in Nathaniel's best interests to admit to my own faults, but that's never easy to do.
"That may not be the best idea. I work a sixty-hour week. I wasn't exactly the hands-on parent. Caleb was." Too late, I realize these were not the right words to use. "I mean . . . well, you know what I mean."
Nathaniel has rolled onto his side. Unlike the other times we've been in Dr. Robichaud's office, nothing has engaged his attention today. The crayons sit untouched, the blocks are neatly stacked in the corner, the puppet theater is a ghost town.
The psychiatrist takes off her glasses and wipes them on her sweater. "You know, as a woman of science, I've always believed that we have the power to shape our own lives. But there's a big part of me that also thinks things happen for a reason, Nina." Dr. Robichaud glances toward Nathaniel, who has gotten to his feet now, and is finally moving toward the table. "Maybe he's not the only one who's starting over."
Nathaniel wants to disappear. It can't be that hard; it happens every day to all sorts of things. The rain puddle outside the school is gone by the time the sun is in the middle of the sky. His blue toothbrush vanishes and is replaced by a red one. The cat next door goes out one night and never comes back.
When he thinks about all this, it makes him cry. So he tries to dream of good things-X-Men and Christmas and maraschino cherries-but he can't even make pictures of them in his head. He tries to imagine his birthday party, next May, and all he can see is black.
He wishes he could close his eyes and fall asleep forever, just stay in that place where dreams feel so real. Suddenly he has a thought: Maybe this is the nightmare. Maybe he'll wake up and everything will be the way it is supposed to be.
From the corner of his eye Nathaniel sees that fat stupid book with all the hands in it. If it wasn't for that book, if he'd never learned how to talk with his fingers, if he'd stayed quiet, this wouldn't have happened. Drawn upright, he walks to the table where it rests.
It's a loose-leaf, the kind of binder with three big teeth. Nathaniel knows how to open one; they have them at home. When the jaw is wide he takes out the first page, the one with a happy smiling man using his hand to say hello. The next page shows a dog, and a cat, and the signs for them. Nathaniel throws both on the floor.
He starts ripping out big chunks of paper, scattering them all around his feet like snow. He stomps on the pages with pictures of food. He tears in half the ones that show a family. He watches himself do this on the magic wall, a mirror on this side but glass out there. And then he looks down, and sees something.
This picture, it's the one he's been looking for all along.
He grabs the piece of paper so hard it wrinkles in his fist. He runs to the door that leads into Dr.
Robichaud's office, where his mother is waiting. He does it just the way the black-and-white man on the page does. Pinching together his thumb and his forefinger, Nathaniel drags them across his neck, as if he is cutting his own throat.
He wants to kill himself.
"No, Nathaniel," I say, shaking my head. "No, baby, no." Tears are running down his cheeks, and he holds fast to my shirt. When I reach for him he fights me, smooths a paper over my knee. He jabs his finger at one of the sketches.
"Slowly," Dr. Robichaud instructs, and Nathaniel turns to her. He draws a line across his windpipe again. He taps together his forefingers. Then he points to himself.
I look down at the paper, at the one sign I do not recognize. Like the other groupings in the ASL book, this one has a heading, religious symbols. And the motion of Nathaniel's hands has not been suicidal.
He has been tracing an imaginary clerical collar; this is the sign for Priest. Hurt. Ale.
Tumblers click in my mind: Nathaniel mesmerized by the word father-although he has always called Caleb daddy. The children's book Father Szyszynski brought, which disappeared before we even had a chance to read it at bedtime, and still has not turned up. The fight Nathaniel put up this morning when I told him we were going to church.
And I remember one more thing: a few weeks ago, one Sunday when we'd mustered the effort to go to Mass. That night, when Nathaniel was getting undressed, I noticed he was wearing underwear that wasn't his. Cheap little Spiderman briefs, instead of the $7.99 miniature boxers I bought at GapKids so that Nathaniel could match his dad. Where are yours? I had asked.
And his answer: At church,
I assumed he'd had an accident at Sunday school and had received this spare pair from his teacher, who rummaged through the Goodwill bin. I made a mental note to thank Miss Fiore for taking care of it. But I had a wash to do and a child to bathe and a pair of motions to write, and I never did get a chance to speak to the teacher.
Now, I take my son's shaking hands, and I kiss the fingertips. Now, I have all the time in the world.
"Nathaniel," I say, "I'm listening."
