Saving Danny

  Danny gave a small nod and then, using his spoon, began eating his food, one pile at a time. First the chicken, then the potatoes, carrots and peas. It wasn’t how one would normally eat a casserole, but the important thing was that Danny was eating. He finished it all and then spent some minutes scooping up the gravy until his plate was clear.

  ‘Good boy,’ I said.

  He was the last to finish, and I now stood and began gathering together the dirty dishes. As I did, Danny finally spoke. He said one word: ‘George.’

  Chapter Three

  George

  We all looked at him. We couldn’t help it. Danny suddenly speaking had taken us all by surprise.

  ‘George?’ Paula and I chorused together.

  ‘Who’s George?’ Lucy asked.

  ‘George,’ Danny repeated. ‘George. George.’

  ‘Tell me who George is,’ I said, ‘and I can help you.’

  Danny stared around the room and then towards the kitchen as though he was looking for something or someone. ‘George,’ he said again, louder. ‘George!’

  ‘Danny, who is George?’ I asked, trying to make eye contact with him.

  But he didn’t look at me or reply. He was staring around searchingly, clearly looking for something, but what or who? He was also growing increasingly anxious in his demands for George. ‘George! George!’

  ‘Is George a person?’ I asked him.

  He didn’t reply.

  ‘A toy, maybe?’ I suggested. ‘Is George a toy in your holdall?’ I was envisaging a favourite toy packed by his mother that went everywhere with Danny and he couldn’t be separated from. But Danny shook his head vigorously.

  ‘George!’ he shouted again. Sliding off his chair, he ran into the kitchen and to the back door. I went after him.

  ‘Danny, who is George?’ I asked again.

  ‘George!’ he said, facing the back door as though George could be outside. ‘George! George!’ Danny was very agitated now and close to tears.

  ‘Danny, there’s no one out there, love,’ I said, going up to him. ‘George isn’t out there. Tell me who George is and I can help you.’

  Danny turned from the door and looked around him, bewildered. Then he threw himself onto the floor, face down, and began sobbing and beating the tiles with his fists and feet. I knelt beside him and placed my hand lightly on his arm, but he wriggled out of reach and sobbed louder. Adrian, Paula and Lucy had fallen silent at the table and were looking at him, very worried.

  ‘George!’ Danny cried at the top of his voice as if he thought George might be able to hear him. ‘George!’

  ‘Danny, calm down,’ I said, staying close to him. ‘I’ll do what I can to find George.’

  But he didn’t calm down; he continued sobbing loudly, crying out for George and beating the floor as his upset began to escalate into a tantrum. Sometimes, when a young child has a tantrum, holding them close and soothing them can ease them out of it, while older children often have to work through it before they can be held. Danny was so little and vulnerable my instinct was to pick him up, but given his resistance to physical contact I wasn’t sure this was the right thing to do.

  ‘Danny,’ I said, lightly touching his arm again, ‘can you tell me who George is?’

  There was a small pause before he cried, ‘No!’ and thrashed around on the floor even more.

  ‘I can’t help you unless I know what it is you want,’ I said more firmly.

  ‘George!’ Danny yelled at the top of his voice.

  At that moment Toscha, our rather lazy cat, perhaps intrigued by the commotion going on indoors, leapt in through the cat flap. Danny suddenly fell quiet – from shock, I think – and, sitting bolt upright, stared at Toscha. She threw him a disparaging glance and then sauntered over to her food bowl.

  ‘Not George!’ Danny cried, pointing to Toscha.

  ‘No. That’s Toscha, our cat,’ I said.

  ‘Not George!’ Danny cried again as though it was her fault.

  ‘No, our cat,’ I repeated. Danny got onto all fours and crawled to the cat flap and pushed it open.

  ‘Is there something you want to see outside?’ I asked.

  Danny nodded vigorously.

  ‘Can you bring me Danny’s coat and shoes, please?’ I called to Adrian, Lucy and Paula. I was wearing slippers, but Danny only had on his socks. Paula stood and went into the hall for Danny’s shoes while Lucy unhooked his coat from the chair and brought it to me.

  ‘Thank you,’ I said with a reassuring smile.

  Danny was calmer now he knew he was going outside, although what he expected to find out there I’d no idea – I could foresee another tantrum when he was disappointed.

  ‘Do you want me to get your coat, Mum?’ Paula asked, arriving with Danny’s shoes.

  ‘No thanks, love. We won’t be out there for long. It’s cold.’

  I set Danny’s shoes on the floor beside him. ‘Shall I put them on for you or do you want to do it?’ He took first one and then the other, quickly stuffing his foot in and doing up the Velcro. ‘Good boy,’ I said. ‘Now stand up and put your coat on.’ I held his coat out ready for him. There was a moment’s pause, as though he was processing or considering what I’d asked him to do, and then he slipped his arms into each of the sleeves and drew his coat around him.

  ‘I want you to hold my hand when we go out into the garden,’ I said to him. ‘It’s dark and there’s a step outside. I don’t want you falling.’ Also, not knowing what Danny wanted to do in the garden, I was concerned he might be thinking of running off and hiding again as he had done at school.

  Danny didn’t offer me his hand, so I repeated that he needed to hold my hand before we went into the garden. After another pause he did as I’d asked. ‘Good boy,’ I said, taking every opportunity to praise him.

  I opened the back door. The light from the kitchen shone out illuminating the step, and I helped him over it. Once outside Danny began looking around again anxiously. ‘George?’ he asked. ‘Where George?’

  ‘I don’t think we’re going to find George here,’ I said gently.

  ‘George,’ Danny repeated. Still holding my hand, he led me round the back where we stood on the patio facing the house. He pointed to the wall beneath the kitchen window. ‘George?’ he asked, puzzled. ‘George?’

  ‘Did you think George would be here?’ I asked him. He nodded. ‘I’m sorry, love, he’s not. I expect he’s at your house. Who is George?’

  Danny opened his mouth as if to answer, but it was as though he couldn’t find the right word, so he said something else instead – ‘George needs dinner’ – and his eyes filled with tears.

  Then it dawned on me. ‘Is George an animal?’ I asked.

  Danny gave a very small nod.

  ‘Is George your pet who lives outside?’

  Danny nodded. ‘George needs feeding.’

  ‘I expect your mother has given George his dinner,’ I reassured him. ‘What type of animal is George?’

  Danny looked around, bemused, apparently unable to find the right word.

  ‘Does George live in a cage?’ I asked, narrowing down the possibilities.

  Danny nodded.

  ‘Is he a rabbit?’

  Danny turned to me, and for the first time since I’d collected him from school and brought him home he made eye contact. ‘Yes. George Danny’s best friend,’ he said so sadly I could have wept.

  ‘All right, love,’ I said. ‘I understand. Let’s go inside and I’ll explain.’

  Danny still had his hand in mine and he slowly turned away from the place where he thought George would be. He looked lost and utterly defeated as he allowed me to lead him back indoors.

  Danny’s assumption that George had come with him to live with us was, I felt, logical for a child of six. Danny had come to stay, so why shouldn’t his beloved pet and best friend have come too? It would have helped Danny if his mother or his social worker had explained to him more fully about coming into car
e – or perhaps they had, for I was realizing that Danny was a child with very special needs who not only had difficulty with language but seemed to have great difficulty processing information as well. I wondered if he’d been assessed.

  Danny appeared slightly dazed by what had happened and let me help him out of his coat and shoes without protest. Paula took them into the hall. He was too preoccupied with George’s absence to notice that his coat had gone to hang with ours on the coat stand. I explained to Adrian, Lucy and Paula that George was Danny’s much-loved pet rabbit, which he had hoped had come with him. I could see from their expressions that they were as moved as I was by Danny’s upset, for they appreciated the bond that existed between pets and their owners from having Toscha with us for so many years.

  ‘Come on, Danny,’ I said. ‘Let’s go and sit down and I’ll try to explain what’s going on.’

  I took him into the living room where I asked him to sit on the sofa. He clambered on and I sat next to him, close but not touching, which, to a child such as Danny who wasn’t naturally tactile, could have felt threatening and like an invasion of his personal space.

  ‘No George?’ he asked sadly, without looking at me.

  ‘No, love, George isn’t here. He’s at your house, safe and warm. I’m sure your mother will have given him his dinner.’

  Danny shook his head and tried to say something, but nothing came out.

  ‘Do you usually feed George?’ I asked him.

  He nodded.

  ‘After you’ve had your dinner?’ I asked. From the way Danny had left the table and started looking for George as soon as he’d finished his dinner, I thought it was probably a routine.

  He nodded again.

  ‘Danny, I need you to listen carefully to what I am going to tell you. My name is Cathy and I’m a foster carer. I look after children to help their parents. You’ll still see your mummy and daddy, and you’ll be going to school as normal. But you are going to live with me for a while. Your mummy and daddy love you, and George loves you too. You mustn’t worry about any of them. They are all safe.’ I’d no idea what Danny understood about coming to live with me, but I knew from experience that many children who came into care fretted and worried that something dreadful had happened to their parents and any loved ones they’d left behind. Once they’d seen them again at contact they were usually reassured. ‘Your mummy and daddy are safe at home, and George is safe in his hutch,’ I said.

  ‘George here,’ Danny said.

  ‘No, love, George isn’t here. He’s at your house.’

  ‘George here,’ Danny repeated, growing anxious again. I was puzzled that he was still asking as clearly he’d seen for himself that George’s hutch wasn’t outside.

  ‘No, love. George is at your house,’ I said again.

  ‘No! George here!’ Danny cried more insistently. It was then I realized that ‘George here’ now meant something different and was no longer a question.

  ‘You want George here?’ I asked.

  He nodded.

  ‘I understand.’

  This was a difficult one, because pets don’t usually accompany a child into care. Reasons for this include that it isn’t always practical, members of the foster family may have allergies to animal fur, the animal might be unsafe (this usually applies to dogs), or the parent(s) might not want the pet to go with the child, which is understandable as they can be as attached to it as the child. But this was a little rabbit we were talking about that lived in a hutch outside. None of us were allergic to fur and I didn’t mind pets, so I decided not to immediately rule out the possibility of George coming to stay with us, but neither was I going to give Danny false hope.

  ‘I’ll talk to your mother about George when I see her tomorrow at school,’ I said to Danny.

  ‘Need George,’ Danny said despondently with his head down. I felt so sorry for him.

  ‘I understand,’ I said. ‘We’ll see what your mother says tomorrow.’

  This was the best I could offer and it seemed to reassure Danny a little, for he climbed off the sofa and went over to the games and puzzles that were still laid out on the floor. Kneeling down, he began to play with the Lego. I was pleased; this was a good sign. When a child feels relaxed enough to play it shows they are less anxious and starting to settle in.

  However, as I watched Danny picking the Lego bricks out of the box and laying them on the floor, I saw that he wasn’t using them to build a house or car or any other object; he was arranging them end to end in a line. After a few minutes it was clear he was creating a multicoloured line of bricks, and I saw a pattern emerging from the different brick sizes and colours he was using: large white, small pink, large yellow, small red, blue, green, etc. I watched, impressed, as he concentrated hard and carefully selected each brick from the box and added it to the line. When the pattern had repeated three times he placed a large blue brick at right angles to the previous red brick to turn the corner, then added a green one at right angles to that and started creating a second line running parallel to the first with an identical repeating pattern. I’d never seen a child use Lego like this before, so intricate and precise. Maintaining the pattern he completed a third and then a fourth line, then halfway through the fifth line he ran out of red and blue bricks. He looked at the house Paula had previously built, which was an arbitrary arrangement of red, yellow and blue bricks.

  I immediately realized what Danny wanted and called through to Paula, who was still at the dining table talking to Adrian and Lucy. ‘Is it all right if Danny breaks up your Lego house so he can use the bricks?’ I didn’t think she’d mind, but it seemed right to ask her.

  ‘Sure,’ she called back easily.

  ‘Go ahead,’ I said to Danny. ‘You can use Paula’s house.’

  He picked up the Lego house and carefully dismantled it, then separated the bricks into their different colours. He completed a fifth and sixth line of bricks in the same sequence. There were six bricks left over and he returned those to the box. He then carefully put the lid on the box and pushed it away, out of sight, as though he didn’t want to be reminded of the rogue bricks that hadn’t fitted in. He sat back and contemplated his work. It had taken him about fifteen minutes.

  ‘Well done,’ I said, going over. ‘That’s a fantastic pattern.’

  I called to Adrian, Lucy and Paula to come and see what Danny had made and they dutifully traipsed in. But once they caught sight of his innovative use of Lego their expressions changed to surprise and awe as they admired the impressive six-line sequenced pattern. Here was a child with learning difficulties and very limited language skills producing a complex pattern.

  ‘That’s better than my house,’ Paula said kindly.

  ‘It’s the work of a genius!’ Lucy declared.

  ‘Where did you get that idea from?’ Adrian asked, obviously impressed.

  Danny didn’t answer.

  I assumed Danny would be pleased with the praise and admiration he was receiving – most children would be – and that he would show it by smiling, but he didn’t. His face remained expressionless, as it often was, and he continued to stare at the Lego pattern.

  ‘Very good,’ I said again. ‘We’ll leave it there while we have some dessert.’

  ‘What is for dessert, Mum?’ Adrian asked.

  And before I could answer, without looking up, Danny said, ‘Ice cream and chocolate pudding.’

  ‘That’s right, Danny,’ I said. ‘Well done. We’re having ice cream and chocolate pudding. Let’s go to the table and have some now.’

  Although Danny hadn’t acknowledged me when I’d mentioned dessert earlier in the car, he’d clearly taken it in and remembered what I’d said. His words had come out so quickly and on cue it was as though he’d had them ready at the forefront of his mind, for when they might be needed, whereas it seemed that if I said something new to him there was a delay before he responded, as though he needed time to process the information.

  Leaving the Lego,
Danny stood and we went into the kitchen-cum-dining-room where the children returned to the table and I went to the kitchen. I heated the chocolate pudding and spooned it into the dessert bowls, then added a generous helping of ice cream on top of each pudding. My children and I loved it served this way so that as the ice cream melted it created a delicious combination of taste and texture, hot and cold. I assumed Danny would like it too – all the other children we’d fostered had – but as the rest of us began eating Danny spent some time scraping the ice cream from the top of his pudding before he made a start. Then he ate the ice cream first, followed by the pudding.

  ‘Do you prefer your ice cream separate?’ I asked him.

  He gave a small nod.

  ‘I’ll remember that for next time,’ I said. ‘If I forget you must tell me.’

  It was only a small point but accommodating a child’s preferences, likes and dislikes helps them settle in and feel part of the family. Danny finished all his pudding and scraped his bowl clean. I was pleased he’d eaten a good meal. He was very slim and needed to put on some weight.

  It was after seven o’clock now and I thought I should start Danny’s bedtime routine. He was only six years old and he’d had a very traumatic day. I was sure that once he’d slept in his room and enjoyed a good night’s sleep everything wouldn’t seem so strange to him and he’d start to feel better. I explained to him that it was time for bed and that I’d take him upstairs and help him get ready. He didn’t look at me as I spoke – his gaze was down – but he seemed to be concentrating and taking it all in. I asked him if he’d like a bedtime story before we went up, but he shook his head.

  ‘Would you like to see the other rooms in the house now?’ I asked. He’d only been in the living room and the kitchen-cum-diner.

  Danny shook his head again, but then asked, ‘George?’

  ‘George is in bed,’ I said, hoping this was the right answer. ‘And you’ll see Mummy tomorrow at school,’ I added.

  ‘Daddy?’ he asked.

  ‘I expect Daddy’s at your house.’ I didn’t know if this was true, but it seemed a reasonable assumption given that Danny lived with both his parents and it was evening. Danny accepted this.