Title: Broken Wings
Author: Songstress42
Spoilers: Up to midway through the third season.
Disclaimer: I do not own these characters, just Sandy and Bob. Everyone else spawned from the brilliant minds of Nicolas Falacci and Cheryl Heuton and I am eternally grateful for that.
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I opened the door and stepped into my front hall, shutting the door behind me and dropping my keys on the side table. The house was dark but I knew Charlie was there. I made my way through the silent house and out into the backyard.
When my parents died, they left the both of us this house. It's an original craftsman situated in the center of Pasadena and both Charlie and myself were born here. We didn't gain custody of it until I was eighteen, but we still visited it often when we were kids. The back yard is Charlie's favorite place in the whole world. We have a Koi pond and Charlie spends every waking hour there, you know, when he's not spending every walking hour in the garage doing math.
That's where I headed. The garage has become Charlie's haven. His sanctuary if you will, it's were he's most comfortable and at ease. I opened the door and stepped inside quietly. Charlie was at one of his many chalkboards scrawling with a furiousness that only madmen and geniuses can pull off. Most days I'm not sure which category is more suited for my brother.
"Charlie." I called softly but he didn't here me. I saw that he was wearing his headphones so no wonder. I momentarily considered walking over and physically establishing my presence but then I remembered the last time I snuck up on him, and I really wasn't in the mood to deal with a panic attack. The idea of tapping him on the shoulder didn't even cross my mind. The one thing you don't want to do is make physical contact with my brother without his permission. Trust me, if you thought that scene in Rain Man, when Dustin Hoffman starts freaking out at the running water was scary, you've never seen my brother. Instead I backed out and headed back inside to start making dinner. Charlie would emerge eventually.
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Sure enough, just as I was putting the chicken in the oven, I heard the kitchen door open and I turned to see Charlie walk in.
"Evening Chuck, how was your day."
Most people would wonder why I even bothered greeting Charlie. His head was down, his curly hair obscuring his face, his gaze fixed firmly on the floor. His arms were wrapped around his middle in a self-hug as if he were trying to make himself as small as possible. To the casual observer it looked like he didn't want to talk, like he didn't want to be there at all, but I knew better. That's the way he always looks. That's just how Charlie is.
Just to prove my point, Charlie chose that moment to speak.
"Don't call me Chuck. And my day was fine. How was yours?" Charlie hardly ever speaks louder than a whisper but I could still hear the smile in his voice. He was in a good mood.
"Fine. Sandy and Bob asked after you. They wondered if you would visit again soon."
Sandy and Bob are two of the people who frequent the center I work at. It's for both mentally and physically disabled people. Charlie hangs out there a lot even though he's not actually disabled in anyway. Still, he does have severe emotional problems that prevent him from interacting with people in a normal way and the center allows him to act the way he wants to without the embarrassment of people staring and muttering and asking stupid questions. That thing about Charlie is that he knows how he is and what that looks like to the casual observer. He just can't stop himself from being that way.
"That's nice of them. Tell them I'll come as soon as I can."
That means he'll come as soon as he feels ready.
"Oh, and Larry called. He wondered if you'd meet with one of his students She's writing her thesis and is apparently a big fan of yours. He hoped he could arrange some sort of meeting for you soon." I looked up and saw trepidation in Charlie's eyes. He's not comfortable with the concept of meeting new people, "She's cool with coming over here if that's what you want."
Charlie's expression softened somewhat and he nodded.
"Okay, I'll set that up." Dr. Lawrence Fleinhardt is a professor of Physics at CalSci. Most of the work Charlie does is for them and Larry is perhaps the one other person on this planet besides me who Charlie is completely comfortable with. It's because Larry has never once seemed bothered by Charlie's many eccentricities, although that is probably because Larry has so many of them himself. From the moment the two of them met when Larry first came to teach at CalSci he immediately accepted that fact that Charlie had issues and instead speaking to Charlie in a way that no one in his field had ever done. He began speaking to him like and equal and not some idiot savant, as the academic community so often perceived Charlie. Hell, he was the only non-Epps ever to set foot in that garage since we moved back in here so he was a good guy in my books.
"Don?" Charlie's soft voice pulled me out of my thoughts.
"Yeah buddy?"
"Is there anything I can do to help?"
It took me a few seconds to realize he was referring to dinner.
"Yeah buddy, do you want to make the salad?"
He nodded and I retrieved everything from the fridge as Charlie went to grab the lettuce spinner and a cutting board. I watched my brother as he began tearing the lettuce and slicing the vegetables. I thought of all the ways people have seen Charlie throughout the years. The pride I used to see in my parents eyes. The wonder and amazement of strangers when Charlie would wow them with his genius. The sympathy after the accident. The sympathy now when they see me having to calm him over something as simple as a walk down a crowded street. If only they could see him now, making salad, talking to his brother about his day. Now when he's no more different than any of us. This is how I see him. And then they could see the pride in my eyes, and they'd see him as normal too.