This Scott boy seemed to be very mature for his age, or perhaps he had a family member with Down’s. In any case, he had completely ignored Eugene’s handicap and made an effort at befriending her pint-sized son. The other little boy: Dame, Eugene had called him, seemed to be warming up also. The three were now going through the brand new box of crayons, Eugene voicing his approval or otherwise as the other two sounded out crayon names like “Tangerine Dream,” and “Goldenrod”. They would then let Eugene stuff the crayons back into the box, completely at random, abandoning the factory organization in true boyhood fashion while the prim little girls in surrounding desks shook appalled heads at the disorder.
It appeared as if the three would get along just fine.
Reassured that her son would have fun at school for today at least, Trudy turned from the doorway and left.
Eugene looked from his low chair and watched her go, smiling his crooked smile.
When she returned that afternoon to pick Eugene up from school, Trudy was surprised to find him out in front waiting for her. His teacher waved from her post near the flag pole and shooed children toward parents and waiting cars. Trudy could see her little guy, so tiny, standing between and slightly behind his new friends. His left hand clutched a bit of the big boy, Scott’s, red University of Utah t-shirt. His other hand was wrapped around the rear belt loop of Dame’s jeans. And it was this boy, not Eugene himself, that carried her son’s backpack. It was not lost on a young mother that this was the exact same comforted position that Eugene occupied when out with his parents in public. He would reach up and pull on the hem of his father’s shirts with one hand, gripping her own belt or pocket with the other. Trudy parked and got out of her car, approaching the trio from the side, where Eugene was the first to notice her.
“Hi Mommy” His grin appeared tired, as if it hadn’t left his little face all day.
“Hello Gene, honey. Who are your friends?”
The smaller of her son’s two companions spoke up first. He was sturdy and dirty, wearing a gray t-shirt with a dinosaur on it and grass-stained dungarees.
“I’m Aaron Dayne, and he’s Scott Fizzpatrick.”
“FIT’zpatrick,” the other boy corrected, emphasizing the “T” with a spray of spittle.
Aaron piped up again. His voice was hoarse from a day of yelling on the playground.
“Are you Bluejean’s mom?”
Aaron Dayne had the appearance of a little hellion, but he amused Trudy, and it was clear he had been good to Eugene.
“Blue..jean?”
The three boys grinned at one another, bubbling at the private little joke. Clever, a rhyming nickname for their new charge.
“Yeah, that’s what we call him. Bluejean.” Scott explained.
“Really? Do you like that name Gene?” Trudy would not have these boys teasing her son with a name that he didn’t like. Such simple antagonism could give rise to powerful objections from a boy like him. It was difficult to tell what could set him off at times. But Eugene didn’t seem to object at all. In fact he stood between his buddies, throwing his head up and down in an overzealous nod. Clearly he enjoyed the nickname.
“Alright honey, should we go home?”
Gene’s previously glowing countenance dimmed at the suggestion. The thought of leaving his new friends at the end of the school day hadn‘t struck him until just then.
He began to breathe a little more heavily, and his chin jutted out a bit. Trudy could recognize these early signs of his rare fits as soon as they arose. The young mother worried that he would break down right here in front of the school. She reached out her hand for him. He blinked rapidly and started shaking his head rhythmically from side to side. Little Scott seemed to notice that he was upset and swung a chubby arm around the smaller boy’s narrow shoulders.
“Yeah, it’s time to go home. But we’ll meet you here tomorrow Bluejean.”
This cued Aaron, who heaved Eugene’s backpack up with both hands and gave it to Trudy, hanging it on the outstretched hand meant for her son.
“Yeah, tomorrow we’ll teach you how to play tetherball.”
Trudy knew that her son rarely thought as far ahead as tomorrow, but the cheerfulness of the other two at being able to go home rubbed off on him and he calmed down. He leaned his head on Scott’s shoulder in the same sort of hug he gave his siblings, then ratcheted it over to Aaron. Trudy just stared, mouth slightly open, wondering what this meant for her son.
The moment would prove to be indelible in her mind, but she longed for a camera. Eugene had never had friends other than his own brothers and sisters. Though she was reluctant to get her hopes up, the two little troopers seemed to be a bit different from their peers, more prepared to deal with a boy like hers perhaps.
“Alright honey, say goodbye and we’ll see these two tomorrow.”
“Bye, Cott. Bye Dame. see ya ‘morrow.”
“See ya, BlueJean.” The two echoed in unison as they turned and addled up the sidewalk toward the crosswalk. Their attention quickly turned to one another and the children around them as it always does with six-year-olds.
As Eugene rolled across the back seat of the car and hunkered himself down in the center seat, Trudy sat behind the steering wheel and watched the other two boys trundle away. She couldn’t help but let some reluctant happy tears streak down her cheeks.
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Twenty-something years later, and some five years after the untimely passing of Trudy Moss, the same unlikely trio entered Salt Lake City’s Hogle Zoo, now grown, but no less excited to be together. And no less excited by a day at the zoo as their elementary selves would have been. As Scott paid their entrance fees, Bluejean claimed his usual spot, grasping the back of Aaron’s belt in one hand and bunching the tail of Scott’s shirt in his other fist. For him, this familiar space was like an open-air womb, comforting and safe.
Scott mashed his change into a back pocket and tousled the hair of his simple friend. Aaron’s muscular arm settled onto Bluejean’s shoulders and the three sidled down into the heart of the zoo. Their voices mingled easily, the conversation sometimes making sense, but just as often not.
Bluejean’s moniker had stuck fast ever since that day long ago, as had their friendship. The natural ups and downs of life, Blue’s waxing and waning health, Scott leaving for college before a demanding stint in the pros, even Aaron’s two year absence in Argentina had failed to weaken the bond between them.
“Which animal do you want to go see first Bluejean?” Scott rumbled down at his pal.
“Don’t care.”
“Okay, how about we let A.D. decide.”
“Okay.”
“How about the elephants then?” Aaron suggested, not really caring. They would see them all eventually.
“no.”
“Umm… How about the lions?”
“Nope.”
“…polar bears?”
“Nope.”
Scott couldn’t help but laugh again as Bluejean teased Dayne with continued refusals. It was rare that anybody got the best of Aaron Dayne, and to see somebody with a supposedly limited intellect do it was pure comedy.
“…gorillas?”
“No.”
Aaron raised his voice in mock exasperation, threatening to pop Bluejean’s head off as he constricted his brotherly grip on the shorter man’s neck. This elicited a peal of laughter and a harmless punch.
“What then, the damn prairie dogs?”
“okay.”
“Oh my hell Blue! Are you serious!?”
“Dayne you’re going to get us in trouble with Collie if you keep cussing around him like that. You know how she gets if he picks that up and says something to her.” Scott warned.
“Yeah, sorry. Bluejean, no using bad language alright?”
Their small friend had decided that a peacock bobbing its way across the asphalt path in front of them was far more important than anything they might have
to say. Detaching himself, he chased after it in an awkward rush characterized by more wasted motion than actual speed. Scott was about to call after him when he realized that they headed in the general direction of the prairie dogs anyway.
He and Aaron just shook their heads and followed at a leisurely pace. Bluejean never wandered very far. He had a sort of sixth sense, a locator that attuned itself to whomever he was with.
Friendship radar.
If he ever did amble out of sight, he could usually be tracked down by the sound of his harmonica.
The little man was not half bad.
His mother had given him one when the boys were all young, and he had tooted on it religiously up through high school and the college years of his buddies. Somewhere after that, the original had been lost, but Aaron’s wife Allie had gifted him with a replacement, a J. Hohner model that she had specially engraved with his name. His real name, like the one his mother had given him. It was her way of trying to make sure that Bluejean accepted her, as a newcomer to their little troop. Boy did it do the trick…
For now, the harmonica was silent.
True to form, Scott and Aaron caught up to Blue around the corner, where he was leaning against a guardrail in front of the tapir pen and flirting with two pretty brunettes, already pulling the small instrument from his pocket to show off.
Not seeming to know how to react to him, the girls wore stupid but happy smiles. One appeared to be in high school, and the other, apparently an older sister, looked to be a few years younger than the three men. She smiled at Scott as he sauntered over to join Bluejean. The smile was not lost on Aaron, who slowed, suppressing a laugh.
Uh-oh.
Scott’s ears reddened, his arms stiffening almost imperceptibly. Despite his consistent popularity and completely agreeable disposition, the huge man had never been able to shake his initial nervousness with girls. Aaron slid around behind Scott to take up a position next to Bluejean.
This is gonna be good..
Scott made a face, twisting up his marble-carved features like he’d eaten something bad, and grunted softly.
Now that was interesting.
Aaron had never seen that from his friend, and he had seen it all. Scott waved heavily at the girls, rolling his shoulders backward and twisting his head to one side, as if trying to work a kink out.
What the hell?
Something was up. Scott looked at the ground, his brows knitted in confusion and concern. When he turned his face, Aaron was alarmed to see something in his friend’s pale eyes that could rarely be found there.
Fear.
Beads of sweat broke out on Scott’s brow as more blotchy color blushed into his face and neck. This was clearly not the harmless case of nerves Aaron had first suspected. The girls were looking uneasily at Scott, then back and forth at one another.
“Are you alright?” The older of the two asked.
Scott looked at her, blinked slowly, and sighed.
“I’m fine…Sorry.” His voice was calm, but it sounded to Dayne like the big man was trying hard to keep it that way. There was a faint quaver that didn’t belong there.
“Scott, are you alright?”
“Cott?” Even Bluejean had picked up the alarming difference in his companion’s behavior.
Scott stumbled toward Aaron, his eyes swimming slightly. He slumped weakly onto a slatted bench. The black and white tapirs on the other side of the fence swung their heads up from the tray of fruit they had been rooting through and stared. Their ears radared forward and their abbreviated trunks searched the air in Scott’s direction. Even the animals could tell something wasn’t right.
“What’s going on?” the pretty brunette asked again. To Aaron, she appeared genuinely concerned.
“I don’t know.” He leaned in close to his friend. “Scott, talk to me buddy.”
Scott slouched over, breathing more heavily, sweating visibly. Dark rings radiated out from his armpits. He grunted loudly, then gave a pained gasp.
“A.D. something….” He grimaced fiercely, hissing through gritted teeth at some sharp pain. “..something’s wrong with me.”
His invisible agony drove him off of the bench and onto one knee. Bluejean stepped forward to try and help him up, but Scott waved him away, afraid he might crush the small man under his own bulk.
Bluejean started to cry.
The tapirs stamped in accordance with his distress. From deeper in the zoo Aaron could hear alien cries as various species of captive animals howled and screamed. Whatever had struck down Scott was having some effect on the animals as well.
Aaron knew that animals could detect impending earthquakes, but an upcoming earthquake would not have affected his friend like this. His mind raced from one possibility to another as a male rhinoceros one exhibit over slammed into the fence surrounding its pen. Thundering footfalls reverberated up through the soles of their shoes.
Aaron looked at the younger of the girls. She wore a look of pure horror on her face, her eyes and mouth wide as she slowly backed away from the panting man on the sidewalk in front of her.
“Hey, Hey!” Aaron snapped his fingers in her direction, “What’s your name sweetheart?”
“Err, Stacie.”
“Stacie, listen to me. listen! I need you to run up to the gift shop and call nine-one-one. Be calm on the phone, and tell them to send an ambulance to Hogle Zoo, tell them we’ll meet them at the main gate and that he appears to be having some type of seizure, or maybe a heart attack. Tell them to send an extra man along because if he does go into shock, it will take a lot to move him. I mean a lot. Do you have all that?”
Stacie had snapped out of her original stupor. She nodded twice and kicked out of her flip flops, running back up the path toward the zoo entrance and adjacent gift shop.
“Good girl!” Aaron called after her.
His attention turned back to Scott, who was trying to control his labored breathing.
“Hang on big guy. We’re going to get you to a hospital.”
“Hraaah…” Scott’s groan was almost animal, mingling with the background noise of the zoo. “Aaron…” He could just barely gasp out his friend’s name.
It was a raspy and rumbling cry for help. His voice sounded like it was coming from the bottom of a cement mixer.
Aaron Dayne was helpless to offer what his friend needed.
What he could do was remain calm and get Scott to professional help as soon as possible. He also had to make sure Bluejean was alright. The last thing Scott, or anyone else needed was to have the young man working himself into a panic and in need of medical help himself.
“Blue, it’s alright, pal. Scott is going to be just fine, you need to try and relax okay?”
Bluejean wasn’t listening. Instead he was crying loudly and rocking back and forth. Aaron had seen this plenty of times before, and he knew that as long as Scott was hurting, Bluejean would be freaking out. He had to help his huge friend.
“Can you please take him over there?” Aaron beseeched the other girl, the older sister.
There was a drinking fountain at the intersection of two paths shaped like a lion. The spout sat at the back of the lion’s yawning mouth, so you had to stick your head into the maw in order to get a drink. It had been at the zoo forever. One of Bluejean’s old favorites. Aaron hoped in vain that this would serve to distract him at least a little bit while he tried to help Scott.
“His name is Bluejean, and we can’t let him get too upset.”
“Okay, but what are you going to do with him?” She nodded toward Scott, who was now on hands and knees, grinding his teeth together and gulping in great breaths between bestial groans.
“I don’t know. I‘ll figure it out.” Aaron crouched down next to Scott, one hand on his friend’s broad back. The massive muscles worked beneath his palm like a nest of constrictors. Scott’s body pulsed feverishly. Dayne could feel the damp heat coming off of him. It radiated through the air and rippled against Aaron’s face. The hug
e man’s pale hair glistened with perspiration, and his arms shook uncontrollably.
“Come on Fitz, we’ve got to get you out of here, there’s an ambulance on the way. Can you stand up?”
Groaning again, Scott shook his head weakly, then changed his mind and nodded. He dragged one knee up to his chest, planting his foot and bracing himself with one hand on the same knee. The other thick arm reached up to grasp the guardrail in a sweaty palm. Legs shaking, he heaved himself up with a Herculean effort.
It was too much.
He collapsed back down to one knee, shouting in pain and alarm. The tremors in his body increased in intensity, coursing through thick muscles in bursts of disorganized bioelectricity. Aaron was truly concerned for his best friend.
This man who had always been counselor, teacher, and rock for others had been somehow reduced to a moaning, sweating wreck. A young family walked by, the father carrying a toddler on his shoulders and holding the hand of his young daughter. They hustled past as soon as they saw what was going on.
Thanks a lot.
Scott was almost screaming now, veins popping out on his neck as he twisted in agony. Aaron tried to heave him up and get under the bigger man’s weight, but the spasms were too violent.
He could hear the molars grinding together between Scott’s clenched jaws. Blood was beginning to drip from his nose.
Whatever this was, it was very serious.
Aaron tried to push his friend into a prone position, where his convulsions would have less room to cause serious harm. The idea came too late.
Scott’s bloodshot eyes opened wide, and then slammed shut. A spasm threw his considerable bulk sideways into the wooden slats of the bench. Aaron was horrified to consider whether the audible crunch came from the wood or his friend’s ribs.
The rebound flopped Scott back down, forcing the air from his lungs with an audible whoosh.
Aaron pounced onto him, working one hand under the larger man’s head to prevent it from cracking onto the hard pathway. His other hand grasped Scott’s wrist, trying to clamp it to the man’s side. Great spasmic waves tossed Scott’s torso up and down in a hellish caterpillar movement. Dayne felt like he was riding a bull.
To Light Us, To Guard Us (The Angel War Book 1) Page 7