"I am, no, I am-"
He cuts me off with a kiss. The action arrests me; it is not what I have been expecting. But then I grab him by the collar of his shirt and kiss him back. I kiss him from the bottom of my soul, I kiss him until he can taste the copper edge of sorrow. Together.
We undress each other with brutality, ripping fabric and popping buttons that roll under the couch like secrets. This is the anger overflowing: anger that this has happened to our son, that we cannot turn back time. For the first time in days I can get rid of the rage; I pour it into Caleb, only to realize that he is doing the same to me. We scratch, we bite, but then Caleb lays me down with the softest touch. Our eyes lock when he moves inside me; neither one of us would dare to blink. My body remembers: This is what it is to be filled by love, instead of despair.
The last case I worked on with Monica LaFlamme had not been a success. She sent me a report, stating that a Mrs. Grady had called her. Apparently, while drying her seven-year-old off after a bath, Eli grabbed the Mickey Mouse towel and began to simulate sexual thrusting, then named his stepfather as the perp. The child was taken to Maine Medical Center, but there were no physical findings. Oh, and Eli suffered from something called oppositional defiance disorder.
We met at my office, in the room we use to assess children for competency exams. On the other side of a one-way mirror was a small table, tiny chairs, a few toys, and a rainbow painted on the wall. Monica and I watched Eli run around like a hellion, literally climbing the curtains. "Well," I said. "This should be fun."
In the adjoining room, Mrs. Grady ordered her son to stop. "You need to calm down, Eli," she said. But that just made him scream more, run more.
I turned to Monica. "What's oppositional defiance disorder, anyway?"
The social worker shrugged. "My guess?" she said, gesturing toward Eli. "That. He does the opposite of what you ask him to do."
I gaped at her. "It's a real psychiatric diagnosis? I mean, it's not just the definition of being seven years old?"
"Go figure."
"What about forensic evidence?" I unrolled a grocery bag, and pulled out a neatly folded towel.
Mickey's face leered up at me. The big ears, the sideways grin-it was creepy on its own merits, I thought.
"The mother washed it after the bath that night."
"Of course she did."
Monica sighed as I handed the towel to her. "Mrs. Grady's intent on going to trial."
"It's not her decision." But I smiled as Eli's mother took a spot beside me and the police officer who was investigating the case. I gave her my spiel, about seeing what information Ms. LaFlamme could get out of Eli, for the record.
We watched through the mirror as Monica asked Eli to sit down.
"No," he said, and started running laps.
"I need you to come sit down in this chair. Can you do that, please?"
Eli picked up the chair and threw it in the corner. With supreme patience, Monica retrieved it and set it down beside her own. "Eli, I need you to come sit in this chair for a little while, and then we'll go get Mommy."
"I want my mommy now. I don't want to be here." But then he sat down.
Monica pointed to the rainbow. "Can you tell me what color this is, Eli?"
"Red."
"That's very good! How about this color?" She touched her finger to the yellow stripe.
Eli rolled his eyes in her direction. "Red," he said.
"Is that red, or is it a different color than the other stripe?"
"I want my mommy," Eli shouted. "I don't want to talk to you. You are a big fat fart."
"All right," Monica said evenly. "Do you want to go get your mommy?"
"No, I don't want my mommy."
After about five more minutes, Monica terminated the interview. She raised her brows at me through the glass and shrugged. Mrs. Grad leaned forward immediately. "What happens next? Do we set a date for court?"
