Ghost Boy Read online

  “How nice to have breakfast made for me!” she said.

  As she sat down, I vowed that I would learn to do more for her, teach my body to listen to my commands more closely so that I could look after her better in the future.

  “My liefie,” Joanna said as she studied the table before looking at me. “You don’t have to use a knife, you know.”

  I raised my eyebrows in disbelief.

  “Why not just use your hand next time?” she said. “It would be far easier for you that way. It doesn’t matter how you do something, does it, as long as you find a way?”

  Without another word, we ate our toast together. Later I raised my hand to stroke her cheek. At last I understood what love was. I knew I’d never feel about another woman the way I did about Joanna. She was everything I would ever need.

  55 I CAN’T CHOOSE

  “Martin?”

  I hold onto the box I’m carrying like a shield I’m trusting to protect me from attack.

  “Martin? Are you okay?”

  I can’t look at her. I’m frozen. Lights glare above me and music pumps out from stereo speakers. Teenagers shriek as they walk around my chair, and a wall of sneakers rises up in front of me. I’m supposed to pick one from pair after pair stacked one above the other, but I can’t do it. I don’t know how.

  “Do you want white or a color?”

  “Nike or Adidas?”

  “Classics, hi-tops, or skate shoes?”

  “Below £50 or above £100?”

  At first, I enjoyed the fact that shop assistants spoke to me here in England. But now all I can think about is the pair of brown leather shoes in the box on my lap that Joanna has just bought for me. She has already spent so much money; I don’t deserve more.

  “Would you like to try something on?” the assistant asks. “Or shall I measure your feet?”

  I stare at my black, sturdy shoes. I’ve had them for about eight years and they are built up at the ankles to support my feet. I’d never thought about owning another pair. These are my shoes. I wear them every day. When I’m not wearing them, I have slippers. But when Joanna suggested that I might want something new, I agreed because I didn’t know what else to say. But what will I do with three pairs of shoes?

  I know that I must make a decision and show that I know my own mind. If not, Joanna will see the truth that I’ve been trying to hide from her for so long. It’s a secret I’ve kept for all the months that we’ve known each other. I’ve hidden it so well that I’ve prevented it from being brought out into the open. But now there is nothing else I can do to conceal it: I’m not worthy of her. How will I ever be a good husband if I can’t even pick a pair of shoes? I’m lost in Joanna’s world, where there are constant decisions to be made—what to eat, where to go, and when to do things. As soon as one decision is made, it feels as if another is snapping at its heels, and I feel overwhelmed by choices I’m not used to making.

  “What cereal would you like?” Joanna asked me on our first trip to the supermarket.

  I gazed at the tapestry of primary colored cardboard boxes on the shelves in front of me and realized I had no idea how to start making a decision. How did people ever get anything done with their days when just choosing what to eat at the start of them could take hours? It was the same with everything in the supermarket: there wasn’t one kind of soup but thirty, not one loaf of bread but a hundred.

  Seeing that I couldn’t decide, Joanna asked me to tell her what I wanted to eat, but I couldn’t even do that. I forgot long ago what it was to be hungry or to yearn for a particular food after teaching myself to ignore the sensation of a gnawing stomach or a craving I knew I could never satisfy. Now I can occasionally decide on something I want to eat, but I can’t choose enough to fill a whole shopping cart the way other people do.

  I stare up at the sneakers again. I’ve been waiting for this moment to come. I knew I would be forced to make a decision for myself sometime, but Joanna refused to listen. Instead she tried to reassure me that I could cope in her world, so I’ve tried to make her see the error of her ways by asking her again and again exactly why she loves me.

  “Because you are a good, kind man who is unlike anyone I’ve ever known,” she says. “Because you’re intelligent and thoughtful, warm and wise. Because you love so completely and have taught me to slow down and take notice of a world that I’ve spent so long rushing past.

  “There are so many reasons, Martin: your smile, the way you look at me. I can’t tell you them all.”

  Her reassurances mean little now though. I can’t even decide what shoes I want. She’s going to realize that deep down I still don’t understand adult life. My fear of the world feels like a boulder that weighs heavy inside me, a shadow that is threatening to blot out all of her light. I’m not what she thinks I am. I’m a fraud.

  “What a beautiful man,” she said a few days ago when she was shaving me.

  As Joanna smiled at me in the mirror, I couldn’t smile back. In fact, I felt almost frozen because I’d never heard a woman call me a man before. I’d longed to hear those words from a woman for so long, but I also felt afraid when I did because it had taken me years to accept that I was an adult. When Joanna looked at me in the mirror, I couldn’t bring myself to stare back at my own reflection because I couldn’t believe what she was saying.

  “Look at yourself, Martin,” she told me gently. “Please just look at yourself.”

  She wouldn’t have told me I was a man if she knew the truth: that when we met Kim and Joanna’s friends to celebrate her birthday, I felt overwhelmed being among so many people I didn’t know; that when I look at restaurant menus, I don’t know what many of the foods are, let alone if I want to eat them; that apologies for something I’m sure I’ve done wrong bubble up inside me almost every minute.

  It’s not that I don’t want to be what Joanna thinks I am. All I want is to protect her and keep her safe. But as she looks at me now, I realize it doesn’t matter what I want; I’m not the kind of man Joanna needs. She will never be able to depend on me. I’m so overwhelmed by the world now that I’m trying to step out of the tiny strip of it I’ve come to know and understand.

  “Martin, my love,” Joanna says. “Are you okay?”

  My heart thuds in panic as I raise my head. Her face shimmers in front of me as my eyes fill with tears. There is nothing I can do to stop them as they start to fall. Sitting in the middle of the shop, I begin to weep as I feel her arms close around me.

  56 FRED AND GINGER

  There are so many moments with her that I will never forget, and this is one of them. It is about eleven p.m., and we are in Trafalgar Square in central London. After spending the day visiting sights and going to the theatre, we are now in the middle of this vast square. Above us, Nelson stands on his column keeping watch over London. He is guarded by four huge lions and there is a fountain illuminated by lights. It is dark at last. The light doesn’t fade in England until late in the evening, but now the sky above us is black. Soon we must leave, but first there is something we must do.

  My head is full of pictures from the last two weeks, snapshots that I will take back with me when I leave: lifting Joanna in my arms for the first time when we went swimming and the water supported me enough to hold her; entering York Minster and feeling overwhelmed by the beauty of the cathedral—the stone and light, peace and tranquillity—as I felt her hand in mine; sitting in a rose garden together and eating lunch in the sun; inhaling the smell of fresh coffee as she sat opposite me and I realized with wonder that we were together at last. There were so many memories to keep safe: falling asleep beside her even as characters roared on the cinema screen in front of us, smiling at her face as she tried to swallow bitter Scottish whisky and watching her smile at me as we sat together in Sherwood Forest.

  Now we are silent as we look at each other. There were so many things that we dreamed of doing before we met, and this is one of them. I take her hand as I push against the concrete with my feet
. I move gently forwards in my chair as I guide Joanna around me in a circle. I look at her and know she can hear the music that I hear too. It is a happy tune—not too fast, not too slow. She laughs as she spins around, and her hair is lifted a little by the breeze. Joy rushes through me. We are dancing.

  Joanna (Joan) and Martin in Montreal—September 2008

  Joanna (Joan) and Martin in Montreal—September 2008

  Joanna (Joan) and Martin in the UK—September 2008

  Martin in the UK—February 2009

  Newly engaged couple

  57 LEAVING

  If I ever felt that Joanna was a dream, then this is the moment I know for sure she’s real. Pain pierces me as I watch her cry. I’m leaving the UK today, and it will be two months before we meet again in Canada. As I look at her, I tell myself that we must look forward to the end of the year, when she will fly to South Africa for Christmas before we return to England to start a life together. That is what we’ve decided we’re going to do, but for now we won’t tell anyone until we’ve made our final plans. It all feels so far away though, as I kiss Joanna’s cheek. She’s quiet as she sits up and wipes away her tears.

  “What will I do without you, my liefie?” she asks as she leans forward to kiss me.

  I look at her and know she understands all that I want to say. She pulls away and stands up with a sigh.

  “I’ll put the bags in the car,” she says. “We’ll need to leave soon.”

  Her fingers trail slowly out of my hand, as if she wants to stay connected to me for as long as she can. But we both know that we must give in to the inevitable as she leaves the room. My heart feels like a stone in my chest as I look at the open doorway, but I must be strong for Joanna after all the reassurance she has given me.

  “I understand things won’t always be this way,” she told me after I explained my fears that she’d unwisely chosen a man so disoriented by her world. “This was just the first visit, and you were bound to feel overwhelmed. I know it won’t last forever because you’ll get used to life here.

  “I know what a strong, capable man you are, Martin. Look at all you’ve achieved. Please don’t let this trip make you doubt yourself.”

  As she smiled at me, I knew I would never tire of sitting at a table and talking with her. It’s one of the greatest pleasures we share, and we are often the last to leave restaurants.

  “Good on you, son,” an old man said to me one day as he walked past our table and saw Joanna and I talking.

  We both looked at him, unsure what he meant.

  “For learning your alphabet!” he said, as he pointed to my board.

  But our laughter seems so far away now as I turn my head to look around the empty room. I can already feel the pain of missing Joanna. I try to push it down. I mustn’t give in to it. I have to be strong for her. But the pain keeps rising higher. Everything has changed in just two weeks. I’ve got used to seeing her first thing in the morning and last thing at night and feeling her touch again and again during the day. Now I must go back to my old life. But how can I when I’d waited so long to find her?

  My chest tightens, and the pain sharpens. I gulp in air as I hear a muffled half noise, a rasping gasp of pain. It comes from nowhere. I look around. The room is empty. I made the noise. It is the first sound I’ve ever heard myself make. It is the low yelp of a wounded animal.

  58 A FORK IN THE ROAD

  This conversation has been hanging in the air like a bird waiting to swoop ever since I got home.

  “You disappeared,” my father says as he sits down opposite me. “You should have let us know where you were and what you were doing. Your mother was frantic when we didn’t hear from you.”

  I don’t think his heart is really in this conversation, but I’ve been expecting it ever since Kim took me to one side just before I left the UK.

  “Mum and Dad have been really worried,” she said. “And Dad was very upset that you didn’t get in touch on Father’s Day.”

  I wasn’t sure this was completely true. Both my parents are used to knowing everything I do, when and how, but I think my mother would have struggled most when I forgot my family for the first time. My head is so full of the future, though, that I can hardly think about the present as my father chastises me.

  Joanna and I have only the Internet and the phone once again, and I wonder how we ever survived for the first six months of knowing each other. It is far harder to be apart from her now than it was before we met.

  But instead of driving myself mad by counting down every hour of each day until I get on the plane to Canada, I’m trying to keep myself busy with other things. My biggest distraction at the moment is a ring I’m having made for Joanna. It’s a copy of one she bought cheaply but loves, and I’ve asked a jeweller to make it using real gold overlaid with a pattern of intertwined leaves encrusted with tiny emeralds. I’m going to give it to Joanna on the day that I ask her to be my wife.

  “Martin?”

  My father looks at me.

  “Are you listening?”

  Sometimes I’m glad that I don’t have to say anything.

  “Well, then do you agree that you have a responsibility to let people know how you are?” he asks me. “I know you were busy with more important things when you were away, but you should have kept in touch.”

  I nod.

  My father’s face relaxes a little as he stands up to leave. For the moment he is reassured. His world is back in place because I’m home again. As he walks out of the room, I realize for the first time how hard it will be for my parents when I tell them that I’m moving to the UK to be with Joanna. I’m not just leaving home, I’m moving across the world. While teenagers might fight thoughtlessly against their parents when they are trying to break free, it is impossible for me not to know that altering the course of my life will change my parents’ lives forever too.

  59 CONFESSIONS

  I didn’t realize that dreams are in constant motion until I looked back at mine and saw how much they’d changed. I made this discovery when Joanna and I were in Canada. At the conference we attended Diane Bryen’s dream workshop, as I’d done several times since that first one at the communication center.

  “What would you like me to draw?” Joanna asked as we sat together.

  I remembered all the times I’d asked myself what I dared to dream since meeting Diane. All I wanted when I first asked myself the question was to be able to communicate more and go out into the world. Once I’d achieved that and started working, I dreamed of living a more independent life and finding someone to share it with. Now I’ve met Joanna and her dream is mine too—a wedding and a house together.

  These things are almost within our reach now because ever since I returned from the UK, I’ve been applying for a visa to move to England. My parents know I’m going through the process, just as my brother David is, but we haven’t spoken about it in any detail because I’ve been reluctant to discuss my plans until they are fully in place. But I knew as I sat in the dream workshop that I had to start trying to tell people what I wanted from my life, so I told them that Joanna and I were planning to marry.

  Word soon spread because I’m well known in the AAC community to academics and experts, fellow users and their families. Although I’d feared some people might resent me for leaving my life in South Africa and all the work I’ve done here, my friends and colleagues were more positive than I’d dared hope. All of them celebrated with us, and I’ve been counting down the weeks until I leave for England ever since.

  Leaving my parents will be hard, of course, and knowing that I must soon part from Kojak is almost impossible—we’ve been constant companions. Although Joanna has looked into the possibility of taking him to England, we both know it wouldn’t work because he wouldn’t be able to bear spending six months in quarantine. I’m sure that Mum and Dad will agree to keep him because they’re almost fond of him now, but even so I dread the moment when it comes to saying goodbye.

  I‘v
e put off telling my parents about our plans because I wanted them to be concrete first. Now they are. In just a few weeks, Joanna arrives in South Africa for Christmas after which I will fly back to the UK with her. That’s why I can’t put off the inevitable any longer, and tonight I want to tell my parents that I’m planning to propose to Joanna while she’s here.

  “I’d like to speak to you,” I tell them as the three of us sit working at our desks in the study.

  As they look at me, I think of all the hours we’ve spent together in this room. First we researched communication devices and then tested them out. Next the study was filled with cardboard boxes full of equipment, and I watched as my parents patiently loaded software onto my computer. I remember the wonder I felt as I realized that soon I would have so many words to say, all the months my mother sat with me for hour after hour, week after week, helping me to learn to communicate, and the excitement that energized Mum and Dad on the day they watched me slowly clicking on enough symbols to say a sentence for the first time.

  They were equally proud when I was offered a job at the health center and when they found out that I’d been accepted on a university course. They’ve been with me for every step of my journey into the wider world: accompanying me to conferences and meetings; filling out forms and helping me to travel; sitting through lectures and standing by my side as I’ve been introduced to people; encouraging and cajoling me when I’m down and celebrating my successes. They’ve also looked after every one of my daily practical needs whether we were at home or away. Instead of slipping into comfortable middle age, they’ve devoted themselves to looking after me, and all I can hope now is that they understand why I’m leaving.

  Since returning from my trip to England, I’ve seen their initial worries about Joanna slowly fade. They understand now that our relationship is real, and they’re pleased that I have someone in my life to care about. My mother has told me that she’s never seen me so happy. My parents ask about Joanna, chat with her over the Internet sometimes, and are looking forward to having her here with us for Christmas. Now I hope they’ll be happy to welcome her into our family permanently and understand why I must leave them to make a new life.