Things I Should Have Known

  On one visit, I extend my hands toward him invitingly, and he reaches for me. “May I hold him for a second?” I ask Mrs. Fields.

  “Have you ever held a baby before?”

  “Yes,” I say, because I have, but she still hovers warily as I take him in my arms.

  I don’t want to freak her out, so I just hold him for a minute or two. I bounce him gently and say silly things and blow soft little noises on his cheeks and hand him back. He reaches out to me like he wants more.

  Mrs. Fields says, “He really likes you.”

  “He’s adorable.” I flash a big white-toothed smile at her.

  And, yes, I’m deliberately trying to make her like me, and I’m calculating enough to know that the best way to do it is through her kid, but I also mean it. Caleb is super-cute and pretty good-natured for a baby. What’s not to like?

  “I just wish he’d start saying words.” Mrs. Fields kisses the top of his head. He twists in her arms to keep looking at me, and I scrunch up my face to make him giggle. “I know it’s still early, but I’ll feel so much better when he starts talking. You know—​with the family history and all.”

  “He seems totally fine to me. I don’t think you need to worry.”

  “Really?” Her face lights up.

  “I mean, yeah,” I say. “He’s a great baby. Even if he’s autistic, he’s a great baby.”

  She doesn’t seem to find that as reassuring as I meant it to be, but she manages a weak smile, and when I offer to hold him again, she not only hands him over, but asks me if it’s okay if she runs upstairs for a minute while I’m with him.

  “Of course!” I say. “And, honestly, anytime you need a babysitter, I’m happy to do it. You don’t even have to pay me. It would be fun.”

  “That’s very sweet of you,” she says.

  David is sitting at the kitchen table during this exchange, but as soon as his stepmother leaves the room, he gets up and comes over. “You’re shameless,” he says.

  “Stop it. Look how cute your brother is. Just look at him.”

  He touches Caleb’s little feet. “He is kind of cute,” he admits.

  “He’s perfect.”

  “If you can overlook who his parents are. And how often he craps his diaper.”

  “You’d crap your diaper a lot too if you had to wear one all the time.”

  “Who says I don’t?” While we’re talking, he’s still playing with Caleb’s toes and the baby’s making noises that are almost words and reaching for David’s face.

  “Do you ever just play with him?” I ask.

  “Not really. Ethan and I are—​were—​usually off by ourselves. I think Margot preferred that—​didn’t want to risk all that autism rubbing off on the baby, you know.” He blurps a raspberry on Caleb’s chubby arm.

  “Well, now that Ethan’s not around, you should spend more time with him. This kid’s got potential to be a decent human being.”

  “Then he shouldn’t hang out with me. I’ll ruin him.”

  “No, you won’t—​the one thing you’re good at is being a brother.”

  “That’s the only thing?” He gives me a wounded look. “I thought I was a fantastic boyfriend.”

  “Eh, you’re okay,” I say with a shrug.

  One night Ron says to me, “You’ve been looking for a job, right? How about you come work for me?”

  “Doing what?”

  “Receptionist—​filling in for your mother when she’s picking up Ivy. You could come right after school and stay until we’re done at six. It would make things a lot less stressful for both your mom and me.”

  I need the money, and nothing else has panned out, and Mom loves the idea—​although I can’t tell whether it’s because she wants me to bond with Ron or because it frees up her afternoons (maybe it’s both), so I agree to give it a try.

  It’s an easy job. I’m really just answering the phone and giving people forms to fill out, then entering the information online. It’s boring, but I can usually get most of my homework done while I’m there, which means I can hang with David after dinner—​he has tons of free time now that Ethan’s gone.

  Things do turn exciting one afternoon, when a patient comes bursting out of the exam room, claiming Ron damaged his shoulder and threatening to sue.

  Ron follows him out. He looks pretty unhappy, but he keeps his voice calm as he says that he stands behind the treatment and expects to be paid for his services.

  “My lawyer will be in touch!” the guy snarls. He hurls himself out the office door, slamming it behind him.

  He’s the last patient of the day. As Ron drives us home, I ask him whether he thinks the guy will actually sue. “Probably not,” he says wearily. “He just doesn’t want me to go after him for the money he owes me. He’s been coming for months without paying his bill, and today I pushed him about it. That’s when his shoulder suddenly started hurting.”

  “Will you sue him, then?”

  “It’s not worth it. Too expensive. Too exhausting.”

  “So he’ll get away without paying you? That sucks.”

  “Yep,” he says. “But what are you going to do?” And when we get home and he pours himself a big glass of wine, for once I don’t judge him. I even fill a small bowl with salted almonds and bring them over to him. I know he likes them with his wine.

  Forty-One

  AFTER DAVID AND I visit Ethan at school a bunch of times, Ivy asks if she can go with us. David isn’t sure at first—​he thinks it might make Ethan sad—​but a few weeks later, Ethan proudly declares that he and Julia are officially boyfriend and girlfriend, so we agree it’s probably safe to let Ivy come. Ethan seems to like the idea when we float it out to him.

  I wonder how the school monitors physical relationships—​whether they let Julia and Ethan be alone together. I have no idea, but at least this time it’s not my problem.

  When Ivy greets Ethan, he ostentatiously puts his arm around Julia’s shoulders before saying hi back. Ivy gazes at them impassively.

  She’s not twenty-one for a few more weeks, so we can’t take Ethan off campus, but we have fun playing Ping-Pong and video games in the community room. Ivy’s a little shy around the other students, but she doesn’t seem anxious—​or at least no more anxious than usual.

  We’ve gotten pretty close to Sammy on our visits—​the more I know him, the more I like him—​and I’ve told him a lot about Ivy. He tries to get her to join some of the group activities, but she clings close to my side and shakes her head.

  On the way home, I ask her what she thought of the school.

  “I don’t like Ping-Pong,” she says. “The ball always goes on the floor and I have to get it.”

  “But did you like the way the students live together? How they get to be on their own?”

  “I don’t know. It’s not like being at home.”

  “Yeah, it’s more like being at college.”

  She’s quiet for a while and then she says, “I like home.”

  So I don’t know what will happen, whether Ivy will ever want to leave the safety of our room and her bed and the family TV. Ethan’s thriving away from home, but he was always more of an adventurer than she was, and his stepmother wanted him out of their house, whereas Mom likes having Ivy around and says she can’t bear the thought of ever having an empty nest.

  I keep trying to get Ivy to do more things out in the world. I sign us both up for a ceramics class in Santa Monica, and she seems to like going with me. Neither of us is about to win any art awards, but we have fun making our ugly, useless vases.

  I still want Ivy to find someone to love who’ll love her back. There’s such a yearning, eager heart inside of her. I know that now. We just need to find a young, gay woman with autism who likes to eat frozen yogurt and watch TV.

  Maybe that’s not the easiest thing to find, but it’s not the Holy Grail either, is it?

  It’s actually Ivy herself who makes a breakthrough in the search. She joins a Face
book group for young adults with autism and comments on someone’s status—​something about how SVU is better than the original Law & Order. A girl named Audrey agrees with her but says CSI is better than either. The two of them start rapidly commenting back and forth on the thread, and then friend each other so they can message privately, and pretty soon Ivy is talking a lot about how “Audrey thinks this” and “Audrey says that,” and it’s pretty clear that Audrey has become her guru.

  I ask Ivy if Audrey’s gay, and she says she doesn’t know and should she ask? I tell her maybe to wait a little while longer. I don’t want her to lose the friendship, which is real, even if it’s online. Audrey doesn’t live too far—​Fresno—​so I figure one of these days when we’re visiting Ethan, we’ll drive the extra distance and give Ivy a chance to meet her in real life. I’ve offered, but Ivy says she’s not ready yet.

  I get it—​if things are weird when they meet in real life, it could mess up what they already have, and that’s become very important to her.

  So we’ll wait a little while longer, but whenever Ivy decides she’s ready to go—​and wherever she decides she wants to go—​I’ll take her.

  Acknowledgments

  I’M DEEPLY GRATEFUL to Elizabeth Bewley for taking on this manuscript and editing it so thoughtfully. It improved dramatically under her guidance. Thanks also to Nicole Sclama, who has been helpful and supportive every step of the way, and to Ana Deboo, who did a top-notch copyediting job.

  Alexis Hurley always has my back and does a pretty good job of protecting me from the front, too. I wouldn’t want to do this without her.

  Johnny LaZebnik read through the galley pages and pounced on each and every sour note, rescuing me as best he could from future embarrassment. (The other kids didn’t help, but I still like them.)

  Elana K. Arnold merits an acknowledgment on the acknowledgments page for advising me about acknowledgments.

  If you would like more information about autism, I recommend checking out the UCSB Koegel Autism Center at www.education.ucsb.edu/autism.

  And finally, one small note: there is debate in the autism community about which term is more respectful, “an autistic individual” or “an individual with autism.” I felt my narrator would most naturally use the first term, and intend no statement or offense by having her do so.

  Chapter One

  NOTHING MADE ME WANT TO GET hit by a bus more than Tuesday night happy pill (see: Zoloft) runs. After a lengthy car ride with my mother, who spent all ten minutes singing a God-awful Christian melody and praying for the state of my wayward soul, I’d have to physically restrain my hands to keep myself from shoving the door open and rolling out onto the highway. Sometimes I prayed, too. That a piano would fall from the sky and crush my miserable, suburban existence. Or that God would set CVS on fire to spare me from having to choose between Mickey Mouse and Flintstones gummy vitamins. Since I was, quite unfortunately, still alive, I took it that God couldn’t hear me over my mother’s off-key rendition of “Amazing Grace.” Or maybe he just didn’t bother noticing the pitiful lives of Flashburn inhabitants at all.

  Once we made it inside CVS, my mother always played this super annoying game of Find the Most Lame Thing and Force It on Reggie. She used to do this to my brother, Frankie, when she took him clothes shopping. Which probably explains why he turned out to be a sweater-vest-wearing, pleated-pants-enthusiast youth pastor five hundred miles away.

  “Regina, look at this little notebook,” she exclaimed right on cue, lifting up a composition journal with a cartoon duck on the front. “This would be perfect for you to journal in.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Great idea, Karen. I’ll write about how much I hate baby ducks inside a baby duck. It’ll be one giant eff you to ducks everywhere.”

  “Don’t call me Karen,” she scolded. “You know I don’t like that. And don’t insinuate curse words.”

  “Fine. I’ll just say it outright next time.”

  She adjusted her cat-eye glasses and sighed. “I just thought it would be nice for you to have a journal so you can start writing your feelings down like Dr. Rachelle advised.”

  “What would be nice is if you and Dr. Rachelle stopped forcing activities on me like there’s actually a chance in—” She raised both brows in a warning. “Hades, that I’ll enjoy it.”

  “We just want you to be happy, sweetheart.”

  There was a difference between being happy and being distracted, but I knew Karen wouldn’t understand. And picking one of our signature back-and-forths (see: screaming matches) in the middle of the school supplies aisle seemed a bit melodramatic.

  Somehow, I was able to break away from Karen with minimal objection. I was halfway through the store before she could call my name from the creams and ointment aisle, but when she did, it was something like, “Reggie, do you still have that pesky rash on your backside?”

  I didn’t respond. Needless to say, her fascination regarding the condition of my ass went unsatisfied. Set on autopilot, I ended up at the back of the store where the pharmacist was rearranging cases on a shelf. When she saw me, she smiled politely and moved to the counter.

  “I’m here for a refill,” I recited. “Reggie Mason. Zoloft.”

  She glanced at a sheet of paper. “Birthdate?”

  “January ninth.”

  “Okay, that will be ready in about eight to ten minutes if you would like to wait around. Sorry for the delay. We’ve had an influx of orders with it being allergy season.”

  “That’s all right. Thanks.”

  I’d started scanning for a place to sit when some guy practically shoved me to the side. “Excuse me, prescription refill for Prozac. Last name Eliot,” he said to the pharmacist.

  She nodded, marking the paper. “Birthdate?”

  “December twelfth.”

  “That will be ten minutes if you would like to wait.”

  He turned and caught a glimpse of my vengeful stare. Brown hair hung loosely in front of his eyes, toppling over his ears. He had this stupid, diamond-shaped tattoo on the left side of his neck that looked like it was done by one of those wannabe tattoo artists who work from their garage and use bum needles that give people bacterial infections. His grungy THE RENEGADE DYSTOPIA band T-shirt crept out from behind his acid-washed jacket.

  “That band sucks,” I mumbled just as he was about to walk away.

  He stopped directly in front of me. “Interesting observation,” he responded; his raspy voice sounded like he was recovering from a nasty cold. “I find that their irreverence toward the norms of modern age grunge culture is kind of their appeal.”

  “Maybe to people who are so desperate to be original that they’re actually more banal than everyone else.”

  He glanced down at the shirt with the stupid band. “You’re right,” he said, sliding his arms out the jacket.

  “What are you doing?”

  He lifted the shirt over his head, exposing a white T-shirt underneath it. “The band is shit. I mean, they sing the same lyric eight times in a row and call it a song. It’s pathetic.”

  “Then why were you wearing the shirt?”

  “I guess to send a message.”

  “The message being?”

  “I like shit music and need a pretentiously opinionated emo girl leaning against a rack of laxatives to help me with my taste.”

  Dulcolax (see: terrible first impression) caught my eye the second I dared take a look behind my head. “Your taste in music should be the least of your worries,” I said, crossing my arms across my black sweater as if to declare the laxative display my territory. At least it wasn’t feminine products. That could have gotten awkward. “Prozac is the worst antidepressant on the market. I couldn’t fall asleep for days when I was on it.”

  “Don’t forget the dizziness,” he added. “I tripped in the shower and about busted my head on the toilet. They don’t show you that on the commercials.”

  “Nope. Not unless the sun was beaming through your win
dow or you were on a bike.”

  “Man,” he said, snapping his fingers. “The one time I don’t ride a bike in the shower.”

  He was staring at me with a weirdly attractive grin on his face, and I felt like telling him to screw off. But there was a slight anger in his snarled mouth, like he disdained convention and flirty conversations and was only still talking to me because I looked ridiculous with MiraLAX poking up from behind my head.

  “So, what are you on?” he asked.

  “Zoloft.”

  “Clinical? Obsessive? Panic?”

  “Clinical.”

  “Me too. Another thing we have in common.”

  “We suck at life?”

  “No. We aren’t ignorant.”

  “That’s debatable.”

  “Not really.” He reached into his pocket and whipped out a strand of red licorice. “Twizzler?” I shook my head. “You see, stupid people are happy with knowing nothing. The less they know, the better things seem. But smart people, geniuses, we see everything exactly for what it is. And then we take pills to make us stupid, because stupid is happy. Whatever the hell that is.”

  “And which do you prefer, stranger?” I asked.

  “My name’s Snake.”

  “Snake?”

  That was the most obscenely ambitious nickname I’d ever heard.

  “Like the reptile. Yours?”

  “Reggie.”

  “That’s a dude’s name.”

  “That’s a misogynistic assertion.”

  “Fine.” He grinned, narrowing his eyes. “It’s unisex. And what do you mean, which do I prefer?”

  “Being smart or being happy?”

  A muffled voice echoed across the store. “Pickup for Regina Mason.”

  “Regina?” Snake mocked. “What a prissy little name.”

  “At least I’m not named after a slimy predator that sucks the life out of everyone it comes in contact with.” I pushed past him and snatched the folded bag from the pickup basket. I zipped the medication into my messenger bag and tossed exact change onto the counter.