Not Done Yet - 7. A Better Place

A Better Place

Jim guided Casey to the side of the house. A flagstone path led to a broad wooden door with heavy iron hardware. Over the door, colored light shone through a glass mosaic of an old pickup on a tree-lined road. Tall, narrow windows glowed softly from the second floor. As they reached the door, a mourning dove called. While Jim opened the door, Casey paused to look around, and took a deep breath. The air smelled of earth and growing things. He let out the breath, and turned. Jim was calmly waiting just inside.

“Come on in and be welcome, Casey.”

Stepping in, Casey found himself in a small entry hall. Ahead was a broad doorway to the main house, and to his right was an oak staircase. The treads gleamed. Jim sat down on a bench and slipped off his boots, setting them underneath. “We usually take off our shoes before we go on inside. Nothing makes a house feel more like a home than being barefoot, or at least in your socks. Kick off your shoes and lighten your load, and I’ll show you to your room.”

Casey sat and slipped off his shoes, and they padded quietly up the stairs to the top landing. “You’ve got a bathroom of your own up here, just the other side of this wall.” Jim rapped his knuckles quietly on the left side of the hall. Waving to the other side, there were several louvered doors. “This is all closet space on the right. We’ll be moving some stuff out to give you room for your own things.” He stopped at an open doorway and turned, smiling, as he let Casey enter first.

There was a warm and even light throughout the space. The room was large. The ceiling followed the steep pitch of the roof. The timber beams overhead cast intricate shadows on the ceiling. On the far wall were bookcases filled with books, tucked between and beneath the windows. Near one end, a small desk was set up. Three mismatched, comfortable-looking chairs sat under three tall reading lamps in the far corner of the room.

“We had this set up as our office, but when we found out about you, we thought you might be comfortable up here,” Jim said. “A man wants a space he can call his own, so you have the upstairs to yourself. We used to have three young kids in this space before with bunk beds. We had already taken those out. We brought in an air mattress for tonight. I’m sorry your bed’s not set up yet. In the morning, we can get you one that suits you.” Casey looked to the left. An air mattress was set on the floor between the two windows he’d seen outside. The pillows looked soft, and the quilt was a riot of color.

Jim pulled Casey along to a rustic cedar railing, smoothed and waxed, overlooking the great room. Below, Carol and the social worker, Mr. Weaver, were in their socks, sipping coffee. Carol had her feet tucked under her on the couch. They looked up and she said, “When you get done looking around up there, why don’t you come on down and join us, Casey. I hear you already had supper, but I’ve never known a boy your age to turn down dessert.”

Jim showed Casey to the desk, and had him try out the chair. A new laptop and printer were set on top, but nothing else. Jim cleared his throat. “I got the laptop set up today. Open up the lap drawer.” Inside were pens and pencils and other supplies, as well as a printed sheet of paper. “Don’t lose that paper. It’s got your system profile, username, and password. Have you ever had a computer of your own before?” Casey shook his head, but didn’t look up. “Well, we figured you’d need one for school.” Jim sat in the second chair and looked at the young man in front of him. “Listen, you’ve had a tough time, especially lately. Your whole world’s been taken from you, and you’ve been dropped into another one. We can’t imagine what that must feel like to you, but we’re going to make sure you have a safe place to call home, as long as you need it. I hope you’ll learn to like it.”

“We’ve never taken in a young man before, but we’re looking forward to getting to know you. You’ve probably got a thousand questions, but don’t know how to put them in words right now, huh?” Casey glanced up at Jim, but didn’t say anything. “For tonight, let’s just take things easy, and make sure we get some good rest, OK? Tomorrow, we can run errands and get you set up for the short term. C’mon, let’s get some dessert.” They both rose and started toward the stairs. “If you want to take a shower before bed, Carol already put some clean towels in the bathroom.”

Later that night, after Mr. Weaver left, Casey took a shower and slid between the sheets. He found the pillows were just as soft as they looked. As he closed his eyes, he breathed out a simple, “Thanks.” It was the closest thing to a prayer he’d ever said, but it came from deep inside.

*

The morning sun struck the white curtains at six fifty three, lighting up the room. The ceiling fan turned slowly, stirring the air. Floating on the breeze, growing stronger, was the smell of a breakfast feast in the making. The young man began to stir and stretch, still half asleep as his feet passed smoothly back and forth between the sheets, a smile ghosting across his face.

Dishes began to clatter from below. Still snuggled beneath the covers, Casey’s stomach rumbled. Carol softly knocked at the doorway; Casey opened his eyes and turned to her, blinking in the morning light. She stepped into the room, and sitting on the edge of the bed, she said, “I’m glad you’re awake. Breakfast is almost ready. We made a special one today for your first morning with us. Do you wanna come join us? If you want a cinnamon roll, you’d better come quick, before Jim gets them all.”

Before she stood, Carol reached out and, just for an instant, laid her hand on Casey’s arm “We’re glad you’re here.” As she rose, she said brightly, “You’ve got three minutes to hit the bathroom and come down, so no funny stuff. I don’t think I can restrain Jim’s appetite any longer than that. I put a clean T-shirt and sweats in the bathroom for you, if you like, since you were packing light last night.” Carol turned and walked out.

Casey blushed hard when he figured out what Carol meant by funny stuff, then it got even worse as he realized she must have noticed the bed covers were tented slightly, but his hunger won out over his shyness, as he jumped out of bed to go to the bathroom. After he peed, he found the clothes Carol left him and changed, pulling the shirt on as he went down the stairs.

Jim was in the kitchen, scrambling eggs, while Carol pulled cinnamon rolls out of the oven and placed them on the counter. As soon as her back was turned, Jim snatched one and started to eat it. While Casey watched, Jim’s eyes closed in ecstasy, and Carol turned around and slapped Jim on the arm. “Jim, can’t you at least wait ‘til we sit down? Casey, honey, there’s orange juice and water on the counter. If you drink coffee, there’s a fresh pot there, too. Mugs are right above, in the cupboard. Pull up a seat; we’re just about ready to eat.”

Casey smiled and shuffled over to the coffee. He found the mugs where Carol said they were. He grabbed one with a multicolor silhouette of a bear; he poured it full, added sugar, and sat on an empty stool at the end of the white stone counter. It was an island with the stove set in the center, an exhaust hood overhead. He took a moment to look around, since he’d been so distracted the night before. Behind where Jim and Carol worked, countertops and paneled wooden cabinets flanked the fridge, climbing clear up to the ten foot ceiling.

Twisting on the stool, Casey studied the great room to the other side of him. A long, rustic table with two wooden benches and chairs at each end sat on a simple rug in earth tones. The table could easily seat ten people. A dark-red polished concrete floor ran across the entire downstairs, as far as he could see. Embossed with a grid pattern, it looked like tile at first. Another large rug sat under a sectional couch in the center of the room. Comfortable-looking chairs flanked it, and floor lamps cast a colorful glow through glass shades. A flat-screen faced the couch. On the far end of the room was a wood-burning stove with a curved-glass door in front of more bookcases. From the soaring two-story ceiling with exposed wooden beams, Casey’s eye was drawn to an eight-foot-wide barn door on rollers. The wood was richly carved in a fantastic landscape, and the mesquite wood surface shone where inlaid turquoise chips filled voids in the wood.

Jim dished the eggs into a serving bowl and put it in front of Casey. Carol set down a bowl full of fresh-baked cinnamon rolls. There was fruit – melons, kiwis, and nectarines, cut and ready to eat, beside a plate piled high with crispy bacon.

Jim and Carol took the stools on the side, where they could talk easily with Casey, but no one said anything for several minutes, while they focused on the food in front of them.

At first, Casey was hesitant, but Jim and Carol pressed him to eat his fill, passing him more whenever his plate was half-empty. Jim refilled his glass with more juice, and Carol poured more coffee for each of them. They occasionally probed to find out what Casey needed to get settled in. The Fishers figured a trip to the drug store for toiletries and to Wal-Mart for a couple of changes of clothes would get him set up for the short term. Jim started a list while Carol began to clear the dishes.

When Casey stood up to help, Carol pushed him back onto his seat. “For today, you’re an honored guest. Starting tomorrow, you’re family, and we get to put you to work.” Jim laughed at them both.

Jim laughed a lot. He laughed when Carol chided him; he laughed whenever Casey was startled by a dish or a pot clattering; he laughed long and hard when Casey grabbed the last cinnamon roll before Carol could put it away. When Casey blushed and went to put the roll back in the basket, Jim reached over and stopped him. His eyes shone when he spoke, “Son, it was there to be eaten.”

Distracted by Jim’s comment, Casey let out a squeak when Carol wrapped her arms around him from behind and squeezed. He quickly stuffed the roll into his mouth. Jim was the first to laugh, but soon, the others joined in, though Casey was shy about it. At first, he put his head down, looking at Jim and Carol through the hair hanging in front of his eyes, covering his mouth with his hands while his cheeks bulged out. He didn’t look back up until after he washed the roll down with the last of his coffee.

Jim sent Casey up to get ready to go shopping, and helped Carol clear dishes and get the kitchen cleaned up. Scrubbing out a skillet, he paused and looked at Carol for an instant. He asked, “Honey, are you really sure you want to raise this boy? You were looking forward to having time to yourself, after the three little guys got adopted.”

“Jim, he needs somebody. He needs somebody more than he needs any things. He needs somebody to belong to. James was right about him; he’s a good kid, and it’s the right thing to do to take him in. You never once wanted to stop fostering, you were just agreeing to whatever I wanted. Well, I’m all in on this one. Now, go on. You need to go get ready. I’ll finish up here. Go on.”

Casey and Jim left half an hour later. In addition to supplies for Casey, it turned out Jim wanted to pick out a bed and frame. They started out getting toiletries and clothes first, then took off down the highway for a ways to pick out a bed. When Jim asked him what he thought of rustic style, Casey said he didn’t know what it looked like, so Jim took up to a little import shop. While Jim talked to the man on duty, Casey began to look around. He noticed a bed in a corner of the store. It was made of logs, about four inches thick. The headboard had thinner logs, about half as thick, radiating like sunbeams, slanting across the headboard. When Jim saw the way Casey looked at it, he told the shopkeeper to ring it up.

Carol took a week off from work at the county to get Casey settled in and ready for school to start in a couple of months. He found her practicing tai chi outdoors first thing in the morning when the weather was fair, and in the center of the great room when it was raining, and he discovered her collection of books on spiritualism. He began to spend his free evenings reading, up in his room, and sometimes, he and Carol would talk about what he read until bedtime. Casey began to join her in the mornings, following her movements as she worked through the long tai chi forms, and before long, he began to dream through the night, rather than waking in a cold sweat, thinking his father was beating on the door.

Casey fell into a comfortable routine. Jim took him everywhere when he wasn’t at work, and Casey soon found himself busy with projects around the house on the weekends, laughing with Jim while they worked. Casey discovered that Jim was good with mechanical things, and was often improving the home in some way or another. Casey jumped at the chance to work with his hands, and learned all Jim could teach him. Carol soon gave up on cleaning upstairs, because Casey always beat her to it. Mr. Weaver dropped by once a week, but it seemed more friendly than official.

One day, as Mr. Weaver was leaving, Casey followed the man to his truck and asked the social worker, “Mr. Weaver, do you ever see James?”

“James Batisse?”

“Yes sir.”

“From time to time.”

“Would you please tell him I said thanks?”

“That I will, son.” With that, he climbed into his SUV and pulled away. Casey walked out to the road, and watched the vehicle ‘til it disappeared. He tucked his hands in his pockets, and slowly turned back to the house, his eyes on the ground.