Deep Bruise

Every night at midnight, the purple clouds came out to dance with the blushing sky.

And every day at noon, the green lightning shot up from the billowing sea.

No one knew which came first. Did the clouds generate the lightning? The lightning, the clouds?

Thaem Mayhew was not the first on Peadro Island to ponder this question, but he did turn out to be the last.

"Ow! Are you kidding me!" Thaem screamed at his younger brother, Seine.

Seine giggled, skittering out of the room before Thaem could grab him (and wring his neck).

Thaem sighed, looked down at his left arm, and studied the pencil which Seine had just ever-so-slightly-impaled into Thaem's bicep and now stuck out at a nauseatingly unnatural-looking perpendicular angle.

Thankful that pencil 'lead' was now graphite, Thaem dislodged the spear née pencil from its millimeter-deep pinhole in his arm and went to the hall closet for some hydrogen peroxide and a few cotton rounds.

"Agh! Seine!" Mom's voice carried from downstairs as Thaem heard the clatter of at least four objects toppling onto the floor at once. "Honey, stop! Books like being on the shelves," she pleaded with him.

Thaem chuckled lightly at his mother's attempts to rein in her youngest child. Seine was eleven months old the first time they noticed his seizures -though the doctors admitted the episodes could have begun before then.

From eleven months to eight years, Seine was thought to have epilepsy. It wasn't until shortly after his ninth birthday that Dr. Carpenter - the family therapist and local saint who helped keep their entire family sane (well, as sane as they cared to be at least) - looked slightly cock-eyed at Seine one day during a session.

***

"Seine?" Dr. Carpenter asked, as Seine, now age nine, sat on the floor of the therapy room, rolling a wooden red truck around on the carpet and slamming it repeatedly into the leg of the wooden coffee table.

No response. It wasn't so much that Seine was ignoring him... it was more like Seine simply hadn't noticed that Dr. Carpenter had spoken. The red truck was highly interesting, after all.

"Seine?" Dr. Carpenter repeated, after a lengthy silence.

"Mm," Seine responded brusquely, raising his eyebrows in acknowledgement, but not lifting his eyes from the red truck smashing (once again) into the leg of the coffee table.

"You like how that feels, Seine?" Dr. Carpenter asked, "When it crashes into the table?"

Seine looked up, his whole face beaming as though it was one great grin.

"In what way does it feel good to you?" Dr. Carpenter continued, "Can you describe the good feeling?"

"It's like," Seine began, then he stood up, abandoning his red truck on the floor for the moment. He stretched his fingertips toward the ground and began to emanate a sound with his mouth open, "Hahhhhhh." His fingers wiggled around in the air, like tiny live wires all pointing at the ground.

Seine's voice began to rise, and as it did, his arms arced up toward the ceiling, the live wires still wriggling, crackling with electricity. "Ahhhhhhh-AHHHHH!!" he exclaimed suddenly, as though a big 'kaboom' of energy had bolted out from him.

At the exact same moment of Seine's 'kaboom' the daily surge of green lightning leaped upward from the ocean, frying the blue sky with an ear-splitting clap and staining the clouds their trademark color of beautiful shimmering Deep Bruise. (Thaem's favorite crayon in the box as a child.)

Thaem's mouth had fallen open as he stared at his younger brother... then at Mom, who was similarly aghast... then finally at Dr. Carpenter, who suddenly burst into laughter so strong it instantly produced tears.

"You--" Dr. Carpenter began, before he was stifled by yet another gasp of astonishment. "If you tried to do that--"

"Not in a million days," Mom began, then left the statement unfinished.

"Even if you tried to tell someone else this just happened," Thaem began, and both adults nodded immediately.

"No one would believe it!" Dr. Carpenter concluded for Thaem, who had fallen silent again in amazement.

Presently, all three of their gaze came to rest once again upon Seine, who stood sweetly in the middle of the room, a big goofy grin on his face as though he had just told an awesome joke, had no idea what was funny about it, but was stoked he wasn't in trouble for his outburst.

He then proceeded to kneel down on the floor, curl up into a ball, and take a nap, snoring within moments of his head hitting the carpet.

***

After that day - which was three years, nine months, and one autism diagnosis ago - the Mayhews had learned to simply 'hang in there' as best they could until around eleven-fifty-five in the morning.

"Ready, Thaem?" Mom called up to him from downstairs. The house became abruptly silent, even the sound of books being replaced on the shelf made its way up to Thaem's room.

Thaem knew Seine would be watching his mother raptly as she re-shelved the ejected books. Seine enjoyed watching books being put back on a shelf. Thaem had to admit: he always understood this comfort, there was something satisfying about it to him as well.

Thaem had managed to clean the pencil-tip-sized hole in his arm decently well. The peroxide's signature sting had worn off, but there was a funny-looking dark ring around the tiny wound which, Thaem realized with a chuckle, was more-or-less a temporary graphite tattoo, compliments of his younger brother.

"Coming!" Thaem shouted downstairs. He threw the soiled cotton rounds into the trash, put the peroxide back into the medicine closet, then bounded down the stairs, making as much noise as possible.

"Whwah-haha!" Seine shouted as Thaem leapt off from the third step, landing on the floor with a resounding crash.

"RAHHHHH!" Thaem shouted at Seine, raising his arms like a fearsome monster. (To be feared.)

Seine shrieked and took off at top speed in a circle around the ground floor of the house.

Mom walked calmly to the back foyer as Seine completed his third shrieking lap around the house, his older brother hot on his heels, rawwr-ing. Looking out the back window, her eyes turned up toward the sky, she watched as the fluffy white clouds loomed over the churning ocean just beyond their back boardwalk.

The clouds seemed to be waiting, almost expectantly, for their daily bruising. Like the simulated 'bad guys' in one of Thaem's video games. She often wondered why they kept showing up to the fight. How funny it would be, she thought, if one day Thaem turned on his game and those bad guys didn't show up. They had quit during the night. Left. Never to be heard from again. She imagined the hero standing in his 'ready to pulverize' stance... in an empty room. If there were no more bad guys for the hero to fight... what would the hero do?

A lamp crashed into the floor at the front of the house, yanking her out of her reverie.

"Whoops! Sorry, Mom!" came Thaem's voice from a few rooms away. "That was me!"

"Alllllllllmost time!" Mom shouted, in her best, most genuine 'excited Mom' voice as Seine raced past her. She crouched, reaching out for Seine as though she might grab him with her Mom-claws.

Seine squealed with delight, increasing speed for one more lap around the house.

Thaem stopped at the back of the house, next to Mom, and waited for Seine to come around. As Seine bounded into sight, Thaem and Mom crouched low, their fingers pointing toward the ground, wiggling like live wires, crackling with electricity.

Seine spun in a circle then crouched, and pointed his ten live wires toward the ground as well.

"Hahhhhhhh..." Thaem and Mom began.

"Hahhhhhhhhhhh..." Seine chorused.

At this point, Thaem and Mom let Seine take the lead, sticking with his "Hahhhhhh" as Seine's arms began their arcing journey over his head.

"Ahhhhhhhh..." Now Seine's live wires wriggled straight out from his sides, then suddenly his arms shot up over his head - "RAHHHHHHH!!" He screamed, and they all screamed together, their arms over their heads, as the day's green lightning lashed the sacrificial clouds above.

A serene smile passed over Seine's face as his older brother threw his arm around him, helping him to the couch for his daily nap.

Looking out the back window as the bruising set in and the clouds began their twelve-hour transition from matte cotton white into shimmering opalescent purple, Mom could not help but think of those 'bad guys' from Thaem's video games again.

She had never realized before... how thankful she was for them. These purple clouds... this green lightning... whatever this cycle is, it has helped her understand her youngest son better on some level. The same way those willing 'bad guys' give the hero meaning and purpose... those willing clouds keep showing up every day for their ritual thrashing. For that, she felt a deep, profound sense of gratitude.

As Seine snored peacefully on the couch, Thaem came over and wrapped his arm around Mom's waist. Mother and son watched as the sky repeated its daily 'breath', where every day at noon, the green lightning shot up from the billowing sea.

And every night at midnight, the purple clouds came out to dance with the blushing sky.