People must not do that where she's from.
I guide her into my folks' kitchen, offer her something to drink, and break the ice by asking if my father is as difficult and frustrating an employer as he is a dad. She blushes in embarrassment and smiles shyly as she answers with a timid No. I laugh heartily in disbelief and roll my eyes as my dad walks in, his kind eyes betraying a much softer man underneath the exasperating sarcasm that dominates most of our interactions.
I guide her into the dining room and we sit side by side at the table, making generic small talk, her fluent English flawless as I ask her about her country, her work, her length of stay in the States. I begin to ask about her family and before I have the chance to finish my question, she changes the subject and asks me about mine. It's a forceful navigation of the conversation; a blatant indication that I've hit a nerve. Maybe I was getting too personal.
Maybe that's not social protocol where she's from.
I however have no trouble filling in the void with details about my personal life, and paint a vivid picture of my loved ones, unabashedly inviting her into my private life, much like I do in my writing. She listens intently as I discuss my husband and children, and as I start to talk at length about Andrew and his special needs, she leans in closer, her porcelain skin growing even paler, her delicate hands shaking slightly as she grips the stem of her wine glass. I mistake her sudden intensity and fixation on my words as miscommunication; maybe something was lost in translation since, despite her stellar English, we speak different languages, our worlds separated by 8,500 miles of land and sea and culture.
I can barely hear her rushed whisper.
How does it make you feel?
How does what make me feel?
Having a child with special needs.
I suppose it makes me feel a million things at once. I feel pissed off and I feel blessed. I feel cheated and I feel challenged and I feel grateful and tired and patient and crazy and confused and lonely and scared and strong and brave. But mostly, I just feel love. The kind of love that makes all of the other things I feel completely insignificant, you know?
I let out a deep breath and blink my blurry eyes to release the pent up tears that have gathered. I look back up at my new friend and find she is crying too. Only, her tears have unleashed a powerful current upon her face, her slim shoulders heaving, erratic gasps escaping her lips. She does not try to contain whatever has been released and I know better than to interrupt a cathartic cleansing when I see one.
My son, she says quietly, in between jagged sobs. My 5-year-old son; he has Down Syndrome. It comes out of her mouth as if she's saying it out loud for the very first time.
Maybe she is. Maybe they don't talk about things like this where she's from.
She tells me about the loneliness. I tell her I understand.
She tells me about the fear. I tell her I understand.
She tells me she blames herself. I tell her it's not her fault.
She tells me her husband can't come to terms with the diagnosis. I tell her she can't do it for him.
She tells me her heart is broken. I tell her that if she lets him, her son possesses the power to heal it.
She tells me she doesn't think she can make it. I tell her she just has to make it today.
She tells me she misses him so much, this being her first time so far from home. I tell her to picture his face as he watches her walk through the door when she returns. And she smiles.
We sit together and I listen while she vents, complains, cries, celebrates; gives life to her little boy. She is animated, alive, all over the place, and I remember that feeling I had earlier, that feeling as if I was looking in the mirror.
Now I know why.
We sit until we are interrupted; my parents ready to take her to dinner and give her a lift to her hotel. We stand and I approach her, except this time she instigates the hug, her small frame capable of a strength for which I would never have given it credit. There is no personal space. Just the two of us, our eyes closed shut, our hearts wide open.
We end our embrace, promise to keep in touch.
She whispers in my ear, Thank you.
I watch as they get in the car, reverse out of the driveway, make their way down the street, and I think about those 8,500 miles that technically separate us, knowing that the geographic distance is irrelevant.
Because as it turns out, we speak the same language after all.
