Other than a terrifying seizure when he was around eight, physically, he emerged fine. Though he was undersized and had teeth that needed but would never see braces, he was healthy and normal in appearance. His cognitive state, however, was a much different story. Doctors used the term developmentally delayed, but we never took to this description, for it conveyed hope, implied a temporary condition. Ethan wasn’t delayed. He was going to be three years old forever. Meanwhile, the rest of us kept getting older.
His comprehension, we concluded over the years, was a crapshoot. We were never sure what he was understanding. Some abstract things—death, heaven, where the sun goes when it sets, what the moon was—were simply and permanently beyond him. Others—changing weather, time, anger, the concept of family—he seemed to grasp. Every so often, after listening to a conversation, or observing an action or scene, he would surprise us with an appropriate comment or gesture.
While he had a minimal attention span, adolescence brought some new interests, and additional relief. He began watching basketball on TV, and while he didn’t understand most of what he was seeing—the rules, the score—he understood the overall objective of the game, get the ball in the basket, and as a result enjoyed watching others play.
Hoops became his thing. Over time, he began to play with me, developing a skill for shooting. His style was unorthodox, he held the ball down low in front of his chest and shot with both hands, but somehow the ball went in. He could shoot for up to an hour, an astounding length of time for him to do any one thing. Afterward he would summarize the game: “How. Many. Me. Make?” (“You made one hundred baskets, Ethan.”) “How. Many. Dad. Make?” (“I made five.”) “Go. Illini!”
“Yes, go, Illini!”
Eventually, along with his love of basketball, a basic sense of humor also emerged; he understood and even loved slapstick comedy. Pratfalls and body function references and noises—hence Stinky Bear—were his favorites, so in that one regard, at least, he was a normal male.
He also loved his family. If we were all together, he would bring us into a circle, make us hold hands, and sing, “Family! Family! Family! U!… S!… Aaaaa!” I have no idea what the origin was, really no clue, but it became a staple of his, and both a source of embarrassment and amusement, depending on the moment or occasion.
As I drove on, my retrospective inevitably turned into a review of my Overall Plan. Was I doing the right thing? Would he be happy? Exactly how and when was I going to officially fill in Mary? A host of questions, of worries, each one weighing me down.
Being able to think—this was the downside of Ethan being quiet.
Somewhere close to Louisville, my thoughts took a turn for the worse. (Note: I don’t know much about depression, I’ve made no effort to research its clinical definition, never been to a therapist, do not take antidepressants, but I suspect that I suffer from a mild form of it from time to time, an Ethan-induced Black Despair. It didn’t stay with me, it was not permanent, but it was there—a hole I occasionally and without warning fell into, impenetrably dark and hopeless. I suddenly felt myself falling into that hole, now falling fast.) I switched lanes, opened the window a crack, took deep breaths, and tried to settle myself. Nothing was helping, though, so I slowed then stopped on the shoulder; apparently, I had started to cry.
I was at the lowest level, the deepest part of the Black Despair, when I heard my phone go off, a faint buzzing, then louder. The outside world, a thin light down the mine shaft. I groped for it on the seat next to me, answered.
“Hello?”
“Mr. Nichols?”
I opened my eyes, cleared my throat. I didn’t recognize the voice. “Yeah?”
“This is Kyle Baker from across the street.”
“Who?” I stopped with the crying, sniffled some. “Oh, yeah, right. Kyle.”
“I thought you might be coming today, but I wasn’t sure.”
I sniffled again, wiped my eyes, checked the rearview mirror, tried to get my bearings: Ethan was sleeping, I was in Kentucky, my name was John Nichols, I was on my way to my daughter’s wedding and things were going to be okay. “Yeah, right, I am. We are. We’re actually about twenty minutes away. I think. We’ll be there soon. I’ll call you when we get there, and maybe we can meet or get an early dinner or something.”
“I was thinking that maybe we can go to a park, shoot around. It’s supposed to stop raining. I live right near a park. It has a good court.”
“Hoops. Okay, yeah, hoops, that would be good, great. Yeah, I’ll call when we get closer. Thanks. Thank you. Looking forward to seeing you. Thank you.” I put the phone down, cleared my throat again, and started up the van. Ethan was still sleeping, my name was still John Nichols, and I was on my way to play basketball. Things were going to be okay.