No different flesh

by Зенна Гендерсон Гендерсон

  Father could hardly believe his eyes when he checked the boy's burns next morning. "They're healing already! he said to Mama. "Look!"

  I crowded closer to see, too, almost spilling the olive oil we were using on him. I looked at the boy's left wrist where I remembered a big, raw oozing place just where the cuff of his clothes had ended. The wrist was dry now and covered with the faint pink of new skin.

  "But his face," said Mama. "His poor face and his eyes!" She turned away, blinking tears, and reached for a cup of water. "He must have lots of liquids," she said, matter-of-factly.

  "But if he's unconscious-" I clutched at my few lessons in home care of the sick.

  Father lifted the boy's head and shoulders carefully, but even his care wasn't gentle enough. The boy moaned and murmured something. Father held the cup to his blistered mouth and tipped the water to the dry lips. There was a moment's pause, then the water was gulped eagerly and the boy murmured something again.

  "More?" asked Father clearly. "More?"

  The face rolled to him, then away, and there was no answer.

  "He'll need much care for a while," Father said to Mama as they anointed his burns and put on fresh bandages. "Do you think you can manage under the circumstances?"

  Mama nodded. "With Barney to help with the lifting."

  "Sure I'll help," I said. Then to Father, "Should I have said meteorite?"

  He nodded gravely. Then he said, "There are other planets." And left me to digest that one!

  Father was spending his days digging for water in the river bottom. He had located one fair-sized pool that so far was keeping our livestock watered. We could still find drinking water for us up Sometime Creek. But the blue shimmer Of the sky got more and more like heated metal. Heat was like a hand, pressing everything under the sky down into the powdery dead ground.

  The boy was soon sitting up and eating a little of the little we had. But still no word from him, not a sound, even when we changed the dressings on his deeply charred left shoulder, or when the scabs across his left cheek cracked across and bled.

  Then, one day, when all of us had been out of the cabin, straining our eyes prayerfully at the faint shadow of a cloud I thought I had seen over the distant Coronas, we came back, disheartened, to find the boy sitting in Mama's rocker by the window. But we had to carry him hack to the cot. His feet seemed to have forgotten how to make steps.

  Father looked down at him lying quietly on the cot. "If he can make it to the window, he can begin to take care of his own needs. Mother is overburdened as it is."

  So I was supposed to explain to him that there would be no more basin for his use, hut that the chamberpot under the cot was for him! How do you explain to someone who can't see and doesn't talk and that you're not at all sure even hears you? I told Father I felt like a mother cat training a kitten.

  "Come on, fellow," I said to him, glad we had the cabin to ourselves. I tugged at his unscarred right arm and urged him until, his breath catching between clenched teeth, he sat up and swung his feet over the cot edge. His hand went out to me and touched my cheek. His bandaged face turned to me and his hand faltered. Then quickly he traced my features-my eyes, my nose, my ears, across my head, and down to my shoulders. Then he sighed a relieved sigh and both his hands went out to rest briefly on my two shoulders. His mouth distorted in a ghost of a smile, and he touched my wrist.

  "What did you expect?" I laughed. "Horns?"

  Then I sat back, astonished, as his fingertip probed my temple just where I had visualized a horn, curled twice and with a shiny black tip.

  "Well!" I said. "Mind reader!"

  Just then Mama and Father came back into the cabin. The boy lay down slowly on the cot. Oh, well, the explanations could wait until the need arose.

  We ate supper and I helped Mama clear up afterward. I was bringing the evening books to the pool of light on the table around the lamp when a movement from the cot drew my eyes. The boy was sitting on the edge, groping to come to his feet. I hurried to him, wondering what to do with Mama in the room, then as I reached for the boy's arm, I flicked a glance at Father. My mouth opened to wonder how I had known what the boy wanted and how he knew about the Little House outside. But a hand closed on my arm and I moved toward the door, with the boy. The door dosed behind us with a chuck. Through the starry darkness we moved down the path to the Little House. He went in. I waited by the door. He emerged and we went back up the path and into the house. He eased himself down on the cot, turned his face away from the light, and became quiet.

  I wet my astonished lips and looked at Father. His lips quirked. "You're some mother cat!" he said.

  But Mama wasn't smiling as I slid into my place at the table. Her eyes were

  wide and dark. "But he didn't touch the floor, James! And he didn't take one single step! He-he floated!"

  Not one single step! I swiftly reviewed our walk and I couldn't remember the rhythm of any steps at all-except my own. My eyes questioned Father, but he only said, "If he's to mingle with us, he must have a name."

  "Timothy," I said instantly.

  "Why Timothy?" asked Father.

  "Because that's his name," I said blankly. "Timothy."

  So after awhile Timothy came to the table to eat, dressed in some of my clothes. He was wonderfully at ease with knife and fork and spoon though his eyes were still scabbed over and hidden behind bandages. Merry babbled to him happily, whacking at him with her spoon, her few words meaning as much to him as all our talking, which apparently was nothing. He labored at making his feet take steps again and Mama didn't have his steplessness to worry about any more. He sat with us during our evening readings with no more response than if we sat in silence. Except that after the first evening he joined us, his right hand always made some sort of sign in the air at the beginning and end of our prayer time. His left arm wasn't working yet because of the deep burns on his shoulder.

  Though Mama's worries over Timothy's steplessness were over, I had all kinds of worries to take my mind off the baking, dust-blown fields outside and even off the slow, heartbreaking curling of the leaves on our small orchard trees. I was beginning to hear things. I began to know when Timothy was thirsty or when he wanted to go to the Little House. I began to know what food he wanted more of and what he didn't care for. And it scared me. I didn't want to know-not without words.

  Then Mama's time came. When at last the pains were coming pretty close together, Father sent me with Timothy and Merry away from the house, away from the task the two had before them. I knew the worry they had plaguing them besides the ordinary worry of childbirth and I prayed soundlessly as I lifted Merry and herded Timothy before me out to our orchard. And when my prayers tripped over their own anxiety and dissolved into wordlessness, I talked.

  I told Timothy all about the ranch and the orchard and how Father had found me the other night pouring one of my cups of drinking water on the ground by my favorite smallest tree and how he'd told me it wouldn't help because the roots were too deep for so little water to reach. And I talked about all the little dead babies and how healthy Merry was but how worried we were for the new baby. And-and-well, I babbled until I ran out of words and sat under my dying favorite, shivering in the heat and hugging Merry. I pushed my face against her tumbled hair so no one could see my face puckering for tears. After I managed to snuff them back, I looked up and blinked.

  Timothy was gone. He was streaking for the house, with not even one step! His feet were skimming above the furrows in the orchard. His arms were out in front of him like a sleepwalker but he was threading between the trees as though he could see. I started after him, fumbling with Merry, who was sliding out of my arms, leaving her crumpled clothes behind, her bare legs threshing and her cries muffling in her skirts. I snatched her up more securely and, shucking her dress down around her as I ran, dropped her into her porch-pen. Timothy was fumbling at the door latch. I opened it and we went into the home.

  Father was working over a small bundle on
the scrubbed kitchen table. Timothy crouched by Mama's bed, his hands holding one of hers tightly. Mama's breath was quieting down in shuddering gulps. She turned her face and pressed her eyes against her free wrist. "It hasn't cried," she whispered hopelessly. "Why doesn't it cry?

  Father turned from the table, his whole body drooping. "It never even breathed, Rachel. It's perfectly formed, but it never breathed at all."

  Mama stared up at the roof of the cabin. "The clothes are in the trunk," she said quietly, "and a pink blanket."

  And Father sent me out to find a burying place.

  The light went out of our house. We went the weary round of things that had to be done to keep living and even Merry stood quietly, her hands on the top board of her porch-pen, her wide eyes barely overtopping it, and stared out at the hillside for long stretches of time. And Father, who had always been an unmoved mainstay no matter what happened, was broken, silent and uncommunicating.

  We seldom mentioned the baby. We had buried my hoped-for little brother up on the hill under a scrub oak. When Mama was well enough, we all went up there and read the service for the dead, but no one cried as we stood around the tiny, powdery-dry, naked little grave. Timothy held Mama's hand all the way up there and all the way back. And Mama half smiled at him when we got back to the house.

  Father said quietly, as he laid down the prayer book, "Why must he hang onto

  you?" Mama and I were startled at his tone of voice.

  "But, James," Mama protested. "He's blind!"

  "How many things has he bumped into since he's been up and around?" asked Father. "How often has he spilled food or groped for a chair?" He turned a bitter face toward Timothy. "And hanging onto you, he doesn't have to see-" Father broke off and turned to the window.

  "James," Mama went to him quickly, "don't make Timothy a whipping boy for your sorrow. God gave him into our keeping. 'The Lord giveth-"

  "I'm sorry, Rachel." Father gathered Mama closely with one arm. "This 'taking away' period is bad. Not only the baby-"

  "I know," said Mama. "But when Timothy touches me, the sorrow is lessened and I can feel the joy-"

  "Joy!" Father spun Mama away from his shoulder. I shook for the seldom seen anger in his face.

  "James!" said Mama. "'Weeping may endure for a night but joy cometh in the morning.' Let Timothy touch your hand-"

  Father left the house without a glance at any of us. He gathered up Merry from the porch-pen and trudged away through the dying orchard.

  That night, while Mama was reading, I got up to get Timothy a drink.

  "You're interrupting your mother," said Father quietly.

  "I'm sorry," I said, "Timothy is thirsty."

  "Sit down," said Father ominously. I sat.

  When our evening was finished, I asked, "May I get him a drink now?"

  Father slowly sat down again at the table. "How do you know he wants a drink?" he asked.

  "I-I just know," I stumbled, watching Timmy leave the table. "It comes into my mind."

  "Comes into your mind." Father seemed to lay the words out on the table in front of him and look at them. After a silence he said, "How does it come into your mind? Does it say, Timothy is thirsty-he wants a drink?"

  "No," I said, unhappily, looking at Father's lamplight-flooded face, wondering if he was, for the first time in my life, ridiculing me. "There aren't any words. Only a feeling-only a knowing that he's thirsty."

  "And you." His face shadowed as he turned it to look at Mama. "When he touches your hand, are there words-Joy, have joy?"

  "No," said Mama. "Only the feeling that God is over all and that sorrow is a shadow and that-that the baby was called back into the Presence."

  Father turned back to me. "If Timothy can make you know he is thirsty, he can tell you he is. You are not to give him a drink until he asks for it."

  "But, Father! He can't talk!" I protested.

  "He has a voice," said Father. "He hasn't talked since he became conscious after the fire, but he said some words before then. Not our words, but words. If he can be blind and still not stumble, if he can comfort a bereaved mother by the touch of the hand, if he can make you know he's thirsty, he can talk." I didn't argue. You don't with Father. They started getting ready for bed. I went to Timothy and sat beside him on the cot. He didn't put out his hand for

  the cup of water he wanted. He knew I didn't have it.

  "You have to ask for it," I told him. "You have to say you're thirsty." His blind face turned to me and two of his fingers touched my wrist. I suddenly realized that this was something he often did lately. Maybe being blind be could hear better by touching me. I felt the thought was foolish before I finished it. But I said again, "You have to ask for it. You must tell me, 'I'm thirsty. I want a drink, please.' You must talk."

  Timothy turned from me and lay down on the cot. Mama sighed sharply. Father blew out the lamp, leaving me in the dark to spread my pallet on the floor and go to bed.

  The next morning we were all up before sunrise. Father had all our good barrels loaded on the hayrack and was going to Tolliver's Wells for water. He and Mama counted out our small supply of cash with tight lips and few words. In times like these water was gold. And what would we do when we had no more money?

  We prayed together before Father left, and the house felt shadowy and empty with him gone. We pushed our breakfasts around our plates and then put them away for lunch.

  What is there to do on a ranch that is almost dead? I took Pilgrim's Progress to the corner of the front porch and sat with it on my lap and stared across the yard without seeing anything, sinking into my own Slough of Despond. I took a deep breath and roused a little as Timothy came out onto the porch. He had a cup in his hand. "I'm thirsty," he said slowly but distinctly, "I want a drink, please."

  I scrambled awkwardly to my feet and took the cup from him. Mama came to the door. "What did you say, Barney?"

  "I didn't say anything," I said, my grin almost splitting my face. "Timmy did!" We went into the house and I dipped a cup of water for Timmy.

  "Thank you," he said and drank it all. Then he put the cup down by the bucket and went back to the porch.

  "He could have got the drink himself," Mama said. wonderingly, "he can find his way around. And yet he waited, thirsty, until he could ask you for it."

  "I guess he knows he has to mind Father, tool" I laughed shakily.

  It was a two days' round trip to Tolliver's Wells and the first day stretched out endlessly. In the heat of noon, I slept, heavily and unrefreshingly. I woke, drenched with sweat, my tongue swollen and dry from sleeping with my mouth open. I sat up, my head swimming and my heart thumping audibly in my ears. Merry and Mama were still sleeping on the big bed, a mosquito bar over them to keep the flies off. I wallowed my dry tongue and swallowed. Then I staggered up from my pallet. Where was Timothy?

  Maybe he had gone to the Little House by himself. I looked out the window. He wasn't in sight and the door swung half open. I waited a minute but he didn't come out. Where was Timothy?

  I stumbled out onto the front porch and looked around. No Timothy. I started for the barn, rounding the corner of the house, and there he was! He was sitting on the ground, half in the sun, half in the shade of the house. He had the cup in one hand and the fingers of the other hand were splashing in the water. His blind face was intent.

  "Timmy!" I cried, and he looked up with a start, water slopping. "Daggone! You had me scared stiff! What are you doing with that water?" I slid to a seat beside him. His two wet fingers touched my wrist without fumbling for it. "We don't have enough water to play with it!"

  Ha turned his face down toward the cup, then, turning, he poured the water carefully at the bottom of the last geranium left alive of all Mama had taken such tender care of.

  Then, with my help, he got to his feet and because I could tell what he wanted and because he said, "Walk!" we walked. In all that sun and dust we walked. He led me. I only went along for the exercise and to steer him clear o
f cactus and holes in the way. Back and forth we went, back and forth. To the hill in front of the house, back to the house. To the hill again, a little

  farther along. Back to the yard, missing the house about ten feet. Finally, halfway through the weary monotony of the afternoon, I realized that Timmy was covering a wide area of land in ten-foot swaths, back and forth, farther and farther from the house.

  By evening we were both exhausted and only one of Timmy's feet was even trying to touch the ground. The other one didn't bother to try to step. Finally Timmy said, "I'm thirsty. I want a drink, please." And we went back to the house.

  Next morning I woke to see Timmy paddling in another cup of water and all morning we covered the area on the other side of the house, back and forth, back and forth.

  "What are you doing?" Mama had asked.

  "I don't know," I said. "It's Timmy's idea." And Timmy said nothing.

  When the shadows got short under the bushes we went back to the porch and sat down on the steps, Merry gurgling at us from her porch-pen.

  "I'm thirsty. I want a drink, please," said Timmy again, and I brought him his drink. "Thank you," he said, touching my wrist. "It's sure hot!"

  "It sure is!" I answered, startled by his new phrase. He drank slowly and poured the last drop into his palm. He put the tin cup down on the porch by him and worked the fingers and thumb of his other hand in the dampness of his palm, his face intent and listening-like under his bandaged eyes.

  Then his fingers were quiet and his face turned toward Merry. He got up and took the two steps to the porch-pen. He reached for Merry, his face turned to me. I moved closer and he touched my wrist. I lifted Merry out of the pen and put her on the porch. I lifted the pen, which was just a hollow square of wooden rails fastened together, and set it up on the porch, too.