He smiled then, timidly, but it was definitely a smile. Another one that broke my heart with its devastating sadness. He opened his mouth to speak, then closed it.
“It’s okay,” I urged. “Tell me.”
Wetting his lips, he pondered how to voice his question. But then he asked it and for the longest moment I couldn’t breathe. “Your low makes me sad today.”
He blinked when he saw the shock on my face and cowered a little. “I’m sorry,” he rushed out.
Shit.
Clearing my throat and making myself snap out of my shock, I nodded. “You’re very intuitive, Anderson.”
“In..tuitive?”
“Very good at reading me, my emotions.”
He thought about my words then frowned. “I had to be… in...tuitive. It helped me understand… what …” he chewed on his lips for a moment, trying to once again figure out how to say something. I gave him my patience. “…I needed to do.”
I nodded in understanding. “Reading the people you lived with helped you to understand how to react?”
“Yes.”
“I get that. It’s kind of like an animal’s instincts. Whether something is friend or foe. Good or bad.”
He sighed, his eyes lifting to the large tree overlooking his room. “There was no good. But many bads.”
My heart clenched.
“But your sad makes me sad.”
“I’m okay.” I smiled.
He shook his head a little. “No. You are hurting today. I see it in your eyes. In your smile.”
The only thing I could do was nod. He was no fool and that pleased me. However, I wasn’t sure I liked the way he saw me. Even Ben had never seen that far inside me. Or so I had thought until last night.
A shiver rocked me and I shuddered. “You ever want to talk about those bads then I’m here, Anderson. I will listen and I’ll never judge you.”
For the first time acceptance lit his eyes and he nodded. “Soon, Kloe.”
Giving him a grin, I stood up. “Come on. I ordered us popcorn and ice-cream.”
His eyes widened.
“You, my friend, are going to experience television and all its magical glory.”
And while the darkness crept in outside as Anderson and I laid on his bed laughing at stupid TV shows, there was a light that slowly crept in. In our hearts. In our souls. And the very parts of us that united us in more ways than one that night.
And before my eyes closed beside him, his soft snores lulling my body into a tranquillity I had never felt before, there was a niggling voice in the back of my head. A voice that wouldn’t shut up. A voice that warned me. A voice I didn’t listen to.
And I should have. I really should have.
“TAMSIN CAME WHEN I WAS a boy.”
It was a rainy day; each drop that hit the window of Anderson’s room soothing to the heartache in the air around us, its rhythm bringing with it a delicate respite to the weight in the silence.
Anderson had been at Seven Oaks for just nine days when he started to open up to me. I’d expected his story to be tragic but it turned out to be so much more than that. So much more.
“Was she a puppy?” I asked from where I sat on the sofa, my feet tucked underneath me. He sat in the chair by the window, staring out at the rain as if he felt its sorrow. He traced each rivulet on the window with his finger, each chase along the glass bringing with it a memory he voiced, and each drop of water a crack in his armour.
“Mary and Hank’s dog. It had puppies. It was a nasty dog, always biting and snapping at me. It didn’t like me very much. But I didn’t care for it either. It would steal the food they threw down – if I didn’t get to it first.”
I’d hired an expert speech therapist and even after such a short amount of time I was amazed with her results. Anderson’s words were more pronounced, his conversational skills much more fluent. She told me she’d never met someone so eager to learn, to persevere like Anderson. He was greedy for information and help, thankfully.
“The dog lived in the basement with you?”
He nodded. “In the day it went up, outside. But at night it came down with me. I remember its smell. In one way I could smell the air it brought back with it, but it also stank like the shit corner.”
I grimaced, presuming the ‘shit corner’ was Anderson’s toilet area.
“Tamsin was poorly. So tiny. I rubbed at her with my shirt, whispering into her ear to take a breath. And she did.” His smile was blinding, a rare happy memory. One of few, I supposed. “She took that breath and wriggled in my hand. It was funny. The bitch, for the first time, didn’t snap at me. Her eyes were large, like she was frightened when I put Tamsin to her teat.”
“I would imagine she was,” I offered. “I think we all are when we have a child.”
Anderson put his thumb to his lips, chewing rapidly on a tiny piece of skin to the edge of his nail as a frown creased his brow.
“After a few weeks, Mary and Hank took the bitch up and I never saw her again. Or the pups. But they couldn’t sell Tamsin. She was still so small and frail. Her ribs stuck through her chest and her legs were like skinny little twigs.” His eyes moved to find me, the darkening room making him squint to focus on my face. “She was like me.”
I smiled at that. The connection he made with a runt giving me hope that he hadn’t been so alone during all those twenty-one years. That even a dog could be a friend. Dave was very much my friend, and I knew how animals could connect with us more than we realised, their instincts to our feelings making them the most loyal creatures anyone could have in their lives.
“So,” he continued, looking back to the window, “she came to live with me.”
“In the basement?”
Nodding, he smiled. “I fed her bits of what they gave me. It wasn’t much but she grew. She loved bread soaked in milk.”
I smiled with him. “Dave adores bread and milk too.”
“And cheese.” He laughed. “She’d always knock it out of my hand. It was her favourite.”
“Cheese is a delicacy to dogs.”
“Delicacy?”
“Uhh, luxury, very yummy. Like chocolate for us.”
“For you.” Anderson laughed after referring to one of our previous movie nights. I’d brought in chocolate but it had been too rich for him, so of course I had to take it off his hands.
“Yes.” I laughed. “You got me.”
His eyes lit up when I laughed, a twinkle reflected back at me as a grin tugged his smile higher.
We were quiet for a moment, and not wanting to risk losing direction, I asked quietly, “What happened to Tamsin?”
Grief dimmed his sparkling eyes. “She loved me.” He swallowed heavily, lowering his eyes as if he was in physical pain. “Hank… he would…”
“It’s okay Anderson. It’s okay.”
I moved from the sofa and sat on the floor by his feet. The horror and shame that poured from his eyes made my stomach twist. Resting my hand on his knee, he focussed on it. “I’m here to help you, Anderson. Please trust me. Whatever you tell me will stay with me only. I won’t judge you. All I will do is listen to you. But I need you to trust me.”