“That’s what I’m saying. I don’t know where to look. I don’t even know how to look,” I say.
“You sure you don’t know what it is?” says Mom.
“Know what what is?” I retort.
“There, right in front of you!” says Mom, as if by the intensity of her voice she can compel my pupils to focus, to rewire the nerve connection between my retinas and cortex. “Look where I am pointing! With my finger!”
“I don’t think you’re quite getting this. I don’t know where you are pointing. I don’t know what pointing looks like. I don’t know what a finger looks like.”
“You have fingers on your own hand!” says Mom.
She’s right. I do have fingers. I lift my arms, putting my hand out like I am going to shake with a new acquaintance. At the exact same moment I make the movement with my arm, I perceive a shimmer of color, and a resulting surge of nausea passes through me. I gulp down the impulse to throw up again.
That shimmer: It must be my hand. Or my arm. Some part of my body, moving through my field of vision. It is my first glimpse of myself.
I close my eyes again.
“Hold it right in front of my face so I can see it,” I say.
Mom picks up the object, and I sense it just in front of my face. I open my eyes. It’s obvious the scene has changed, but I can’t tell in what way exactly.
“You don’t recognize it?” she asks, shocked.
“Not at all,” I say.
“Touch it,” she says. I put my hands out and touch it. It takes less than a second, less than a millisecond.
“A saltshaker,” I say. “It’s the saltshaker we keep on the kitchen table.”
“This is what I was telling you about before the operation,” says Dad. “Object recognition is not instinctual. You will have to learn how to identify objects by sight in the same way you’ve learned to do it by touch.”
“Oh, hush, Henry,” says Mom. “This is hardly the time for I told you so.”
“Fine, but I did warn him,” says Dad. “Color perception, however, is instinctual. Maybe you should start there?”
“Do we have any Skittles?” I suggest.
Mom’s voice is excited. “Let me get some.”
With my eyes still closed, I hear Mom go fetch a pack of Skittles from the cupboard where she keeps the candy stash. She tears it open and pours its contents—clink clink clink—into a cereal bowl that she places on the table in front of me. I reach in and pick up one of the candies. I hold it under my nose, eyes still closed.
“Lemon,” I say, sniffing.
“Right!” says Mom.
I open my eyes. Every color bubbles in every direction. Which one is the Skittle?
“Hold it closer to your eyes!” suggests Mom.
I close my left eye and move the candy immediately in front of my right. There’s an earthshaking shift of color as I move it so near.
“That’s yellow,” says Mom.
“Yellow,” I repeat, examining the hue. “I always expected yellow would be… quieter.”
Mom and Dad laugh. And then I do, too.
I go through each flavor like this: strawberry (red), orange (the only flavor with the same color as its name), apple (green), and grape (purple). I try to associate each smell and taste with its color so I can remember it. But as soon as I close my eyes, the colors meld into a psychedelic rainbow in my mind, and I can’t remember which one is which.
“Pop quiz,” says Mom, and I look at one of the candies she holds close to my eye.
“Uh…” I say. “Orange?”
“No, it’s green apple,” Mom says, disappointed.
“Go easy on him,” says Dad. “He’s never learned his colors before.”
I practice with Mom and Dad until I can correctly guess the color of the Skittle about half the time.
More important, the dizziness seems to be settling down.
“Let’s try some objects,” Mom says. “Real fruit. Much healthier than candy.”
“I don’t think he’s ready for shapes,” says Dad.
“Of course he is,” says Mom.
I hear several pieces of produce plop down in front of me. Simultaneously I notice a change of colors. I could be seeing either the fruit rolling onto the table or any movements Mom and Dad are making. The world is nothing more than a confusing cascade of living color, an infinitely large waterfall of Skittles pouring out in front of my eyes.
“There,” says Mom. “Do you recognize any of this fruit?”
I stare blankly, trying to home in on the fruit that is now apparently in front of me. But all I can sense is the pulsating chromatic glow coming at me from every direction. I have no idea where to look to find the fruit.
“Your eyes will probably cue in on movement,” says Dad. “Here, son, I’m picking up a piece of fruit now and waving it. Can you see it?”
I observe a flux of color, a yellow ripple in my perception. What fruit is yellow? A lemon. But we don’t keep lemons in the house. What else?
“A banana!” I exclaim.
Mom squeals with delight.
“Can I touch it?” I ask.
Dad places it in my hands, and immediately it becomes not just a guess based on color, but a real, actual banana. I know this shape. I know this texture and weight. I know the firm grippiness of the skin, the pointy taper of each end. As I examine it with my eyes, I attempt to record and catalog: This is what a banana looks like.
“How about this one?”
I spot another flow of color darting around.
“It’s red, right?” I ask.
“Yes!” says Mom.
“An apple?”
“No,” says Dad.
What else is red?
“A strawberry?”
“No.”
“A watermelon?”
“No.”
“I give up.”
“Come on, Will!” says Mom. “You can do it!”
“Sydney, listen to him! He didn’t know whether it was a strawberry or a watermelon! He can’t even judge relative size,” says Dad.
“You know I’m sitting right here, right?” I say.
“He’s not identifying the fruit,” Dad continues. “He’s just guessing based on the color. His brain is not equipped yet for visual object recognition.”
“I’m not one of your patients, Dad,” I say bitterly. “I’m your son.”
“I’m right, though, aren’t I?” he counters. “You just saw it was red and listed fruits you know are that color?”
“Of course,” I say. “How else do people recognize things?”
He drops it into my hand. I immediately identify the small spherical shape and the protective outer skin.
“It’s a grape,” I say.
“Right,” he says quietly.
“I thought they were green?” I ask.
“They can also be red,” says Dad.
“Dad’s right,” I confess to Mom. “I was just guessing based on the color. Maybe I can’t see after all.”
“Of course you can see!” says Mom. “You got all those Skittle colors right! You just need to learn your shapes! I taught you shapes once before, and I’ll do it again! I’ll get your baby toys out of storage!”
Baby toys?
“No, thanks,” I say.
“Will, just give it a try!” pleads Mom.
“Whatever. Maybe tomorrow. I’m exhausted. I can’t do any more right now.”
It’s true. Vision is draining. I can barely hold my eyes open now. They close on their own, like heavy automatic garage doors. Fatigue overwhelms me, the result, I assume, of an information onslaught my brain is not used to.
I go to my room and shut the door and close the blinds and curtains. Even so, there is still light seeping in through the window. Bright, confusing, exhausting light. I take the blanket from my bed and, standing on my chair, I tuck it in around the curtains, sealing off the window so my room is totally dark. Peaceful, calming, logical darkness.
I check my phone. Texts from everyone on the academic team asking how I am doing. I compose a group text: “Recovery is going well. But I can’t really see much yet. Sight is very confusing. I don’t know how you guys handle it.”
Cecily is the first to respond: “Can you see this?” I observe a yellow color beside her text, but I have to have Siri read to me to figure out that it’s an emoji. A smiling face.
Nick adds, “Can you see… YOUR MOM?”
Whitford: “LOL”
I do some homework for a bit, then I get another text from Cecily. “Just dropped something off for you.”
“Why didn’t you come in?”
“Your mom. That’s not a Nick joke btw.”
At that very moment, Mom knocks on the door.
“Cecily just dropped this off,” she says, setting a cardboard box on the floor beside my bed with a thud.
“You didn’t let her in?” I ask.
“Sorry, I figured you were probably asleep. You need to rest, Will.”
After Mom leaves, I open the box and reach inside. It seems to be filled with a disorganized pile of small paper. I pick one up. It’s the size of a greeting card. I rub it between my fingers. It’s so smooth that it’s almost sticky to my touch. My phone vibrates. Text from Cecily. “Come to the window.”
I open the window and stick my head out.
“Cecily?” I say in a loud whisper.
“Hey,” she says, and I can hear a smile in her whisper. “How you feeling?”
“Okay,” I say, angling my ears down to hear her better.
I’ve been so caught up in all the Skittles and colors and dizzying sensory overload that I had forgotten how nice it is to hear Cecily’s voice.
“Did you get the box?” she asks eagerly.
“Shhh, keep it down,” I say. “I don’t want Mom and Dad coming in and finding us acting out Romeo and Juliet.”
“Sorry,” she says.
“So what’s in the box?” I ask.
“They’re photos,” she says. “Of everything we’ve done together this fall. So, like, our trip to the museum, homecoming, the sunrise. Every picture I’ve taken when I’ve been with you.”
I don’t know how to respond.
She says, “I know you probably can’t recognize stuff in photos yet. But when you can, I want you to be able to go back and see everything we’ve done together.”
“Wow,” I say. “Thanks. That’s really cool. Are there any photos of you?”
“I do my best work on the other side of the camera,” she says.
“What about that one I took?” I ask.
“Oh, that one… turned out blurry,” she says uneasily.
“Don’t worry, I’m neither insulted nor surprised to discover a photo I took didn’t turn out,” I assure her. “As a photographer, I’m really more of an impressionist.”
She laughs a little.
We say our good nights. She says she’ll see me at school Monday. I say I will see her then. What I don’t tell her is that I have a surprise planned: I’m going to practice all day tomorrow, and if my skills have progressed to board game readiness, I’ll be seeing her at Settlers Sunday tomorrow night.
CHAPTER 19
I wake up the next morning alone in my dark room. I sit there for a while, not moving. Then it hits me: Today is Sunday. Settlers Sunday. For the first time in my entire life, I have the chance to play a board game like a normal person. If I can learn some basic shapes today, I can play this very night.
I would be able to move my own pieces, make my own decisions. I mean, I wouldn’t be able to read the words on the cards, not tonight and maybe not ever—Dr. Bianchi said that people like me rarely learn how to read printed text, which was disappointing to hear. But other than that, I should be able to play in the game independently. Without assistance. On my own.
I walk downstairs and sit at the table where Mom and Dad are eating breakfast.
“I want to learn the other colors,” I say. “More than the five basic Skittle flavors I saw yesterday. All the other flavors of Skittles—you know, tropical, sour, darkside—they’re all different colors, since they’re different flavors, right?”
“Yes,” says Dad. “I think so.”
“Can you go to the store and get those? So I can learn them, too?”
“Of course.”
“And, Mom, can you get out my baby toys from the attic? I want to learn shapes.”
She agrees. After they finish eating, Mom and Dad depart on their errands, and I eat breakfast alone with my eyes closed. Soon Mom returns, smelling of dust and old cardboard.
“I’m not sure if you remember this toy,” she says, setting a box in front of me. I hear the box opening. Plastic pieces tumble out on the table. “Each shape fits with a corresponding hole in this board. You have to match the shape with the hole, and then you can push it through. Make sense?”
“I think so.”
“All right, let’s start with this shape. Open your eyes.”
I do, and I discern exactly nothing.
“Here, look where I am waving my hand.”
A flutter of motion catches my attention. Lowering my head shifts the motion into the center of my field of vision. Bending at the waist to get nearer makes the motion take up more space. The object—presumably Mom’s hand—actually seems to grow as I get closer to it. Maybe that’s what perspective is? Perspective. Which reminds me of Cecily. I’m back in that museum, Cecily teaching me about perspective.
Mom’s voice interrupts. “All right, I am going to move my hand away. Look at the shape. What do you see?”
I keep my head still and focus on the mass in front of me, the toy block that is left in place where Mom’s hand was waving.
“It’s red.”
“Very good. What shape is it?”
I look intently. To me it is a mere red blob, shifty, formless.
“I have no idea.”
“Look harder.”
“How do I do that?”
“I don’t know, just keep looking.”
I stare for a good thirty seconds. But I have no image data bank, nothing in my memory to compare this image to that would help me understand what I am looking at.
“I really don’t know, Mom.”
“Touch it, then. See if you can feel it.”
I put my hand on the block and recognize it instantly.
“It’s a triangle,” I say, deflated.
“Yes,” says Mom. “A triangle.”
“How could I not see that? I know what a triangle is shaped like. I’ve been touching triangles all my life. How can I not recognize one by looking at it?”
I shake my head and sigh.
Mom says, “You just started, Will. You’ll get it. It’s going to take time.” She gives my shoulder a sympathetic squeeze. “Now, look at the board in front of you. Find the triangle-shaped hole and push the block through it.”
I hold the triangle in my hand and search for a similar shape nearby. I look and look and look, but see nothing. Not the triangle-shaped hole in the board, not even the board itself.
Finally I give up on my eyes and reach for the board, which I discover by touch to be standing upright, like a computer monitor. My fingers brush over the cutout holes, identifying each shape in an instant—a square, a circle, and yes, here’s the triangle. It’s so simple. So easy. How could I not see that triangle-shaped hole?
“I have to relearn everything. Everything. Even shapes. Even shapes that I know,” I say, more to myself than to Mom. I begin to wonder if maybe the surgery was all for nothing. I mea
n, sure, I can see. But I can’t do anything useful with that vision, and I’m not sure I ever will.
“You’re smart, Will. If anyone can do it, it’s you.”
At this moment, Dad walks in from his trip to the store and sits down at the table. “Don’t let me interrupt,” he says, and then falls silent, watching me, I guess.
Before I press the triangle through the hole in the board, I examine it carefully. I close my eyes and try to imagine it. A red triangle. I repeat this process several times until I’m sure I’ve got it. Yes. A red triangle. I know what that looks like. I push the block through the hole in the board, and I hear it plunk down on the table. But a crazy thing happens: Even though I sense the red motion as it falls, and even though I hear it land, the triangle itself disappears. I scan the table for the missing block. There are various red masses of unknown shapes. But no triangle. I close my eyes. Can I still picture that triangle? Yes, I can. I know what it looks like. So where did it go? How did it disappear?
“What happened?” I gasp. “Where did it go?”
“Where did what go?” says Mom.
“The triangle! It’s gone!”
“No, it’s not,” says Mom. “It’s right here.”
I hear her arm slide across the table and see a smudge of red as she nudges one of the blocks.
“See?” she asks.
“No!” I insist. “That’s not the triangle I was just holding! I know that triangle! I memorized it. That is not the same one!”
“Oh,” she says. “Wait. Look at it now.”
I hear her arm move again. There’s a click from one of the blocks, and then—What? How is this possible?—the triangle appears! In the very same spot where just a moment ago sat an indistinguishable red mass, there is now a triangle! Is this how vision works? Is this how shapes work? They disappear and materialize, twist and morph, shift in and out of your field of vision without warning?
“What just happened?” I ask. “How did you do that?”
“Honey,” says Mom, “it’s a triangle-shaped block, not a pyramid. The triangle was just on its side. So from your perspective, it looked like a rectangle. I just turned it so the triangle shape is facing toward you again.”
“Rotated? Rectangle?” I stammer. “How can a triangle look like more than one shape? How can it appear and disappear?”
Love and First Sight Page 12