Reaching the bike Boone held his hand out for Andrews' backpack, so he could strap it down, the boy hesitated however.
Boone frowned at him questioningly.
"You thought I told," Andrew accused him.
"No bud, that's not it," he used his softest tone, to minimize the impact of the contradiction, immediately knowing what Andrew was referring to. "I just thought that you'd done something without meaning to, and she'd figured it out somehow, that's all."
"I didn't!" The child seemed near tears suddenly. "You told me about stealing! I didn't, Boone, I didn't!"
Boone tried his best to calm Andrew down, crouching and pulling his son in to his arms. "Shhhh," he held him and rocked him gently.
"All day, I only read you, I promise!" His small body shook as Boone cradled him.
They'd had a heart to heart before school began, Boone not only explaining that reading peoples' minds was like stealing their thoughts, which was worse than stealing their belongings, but that if he did steal their thoughts, and people found out, then they'd all know that he was a thief, and did he really want everyone to believe that? He'd have to face them everyday, knowing that they thought they couldn't trust him. He'd spent some time trying to come up with a logical explanation for the boy, and had been relieved, and a little pleased with himself, that he'd come up with something that could logically be explained to a five year old. He'd successfully petitioned for home schooling for Andrews' kindergarten year, knowing that there was no way he'd feel the slightest bit confident about letting a four –year-old Andrew out of his sight, with his abilities, even for a half day.
"I know you did, bud. I'm sorry, I was wrong." He pulled away from the boy, and smiled at him in reassurance. He took in the grey eyes, identical to his own, the blonde hair that he'd inherited from Shannon, and perhaps a bit from himself as well, given that Sabrina was a natural blonde, the rest of his features a mix of his and Shan's. "I love you."
"Love you too, Boone." Andrew hugged him again.
Pamela watched all this from her classroom window, not knowing what they were saying, just observing the obvious strength of their bond, and reconfirming her promise to honour Mr. Carlyle's wishes.
They broke their contact, and, with the backpack firmly secured to the luggage rack and helmets in place, Boone headed the bike for home.
They went in through the front door of the store, Andrew wanting to tell Tom all about his first day of school; he stopped at the front counter as Boone continued through to the back.
He found Heather in the office and recounted the conversation he'd had with Andrews' teacher. He told her about the things he'd imagined she was going to say, as well as the things she actually had, and his own panic over both. She wasn't the slightest bit surprised about the teachers' assessment, she knew Andrew was above average, and had just assumed that Boone knew it as well. As they continued their conversation down the hall and into the kitchen, she pointed out to him that the latest puzzle book he'd bought for the boy had been recommended for ages nine to ten.
"I just thought that was some kind of marketing ploy, to make the kids and parents feel like they were smarter than they were. Like how some clothing manufacturers make their garments bigger but put the same size on so that larger people will still think they fit into an eight." Shannon had explained the concept to him one day at an Old Navy store, as she'd tried on a pair of shorts two sizes smaller that she normally bought.
Boone had been emptying Andrew's backpack onto the kitchen table while they talked, wanting to pull out the containers from his lunch so he could wash them, he frowned a bit as he extracted the Hardy Boys book, assuming it must have come from the school. He remembered reading parts of the series when he'd been a boy, it'd been pretty hokey if he recalled correctly. He hoped they'd updated it some.
He heard the sound of a child running up the hallway, and turned as Andrew pushed though the door. "No running in the house, bud."
"Kay Boone," Andrew nodded in acknowledgement. "Can we go look at the fishes?"
"Fish," Boone corrected automatically. "The plural of fish is still fish."
"Kay Boone," Andrew filed away the information "So can we go look at the fish?"
"Do you have any homework?" He held up the Hardy Boys book. Though it seemed a pretty unlikely candidate for a homework assignment, he knew that the teacher had been flying by the seat of her pants that day, with respect to Andrew. "I found this in your back pack, are you supposed to read it?"
He thought for a minute, seeming unsure. "I'm supposed to finish chapter one. Yeah that's it. I'm supposed to finish chapter one." He smiled, and nodded his head.
"You want us to read it together later?" Boone asked.
"Uhm, I think I'm supposed to do it by myself." He frowned a bit.
"Yeah, I guess you are." Boone felt a little let down; even on the first day of school things were already changing.
"You could read me some of the bunny book!" Andrew offered, using their private term for Watership Down, picking up on his dad's disappointment.
Boone smiled at him, "We'll see."
"So can we go look at the fish, Boone?" He repeated his earlier question.
"I'm afraid not, Andrew, I have to get dinner ready." Boone apologized, feeling even worse as the boys' face fell in disappointment.
"I'll make dinner, dear." Heather offered immediately. "Just tell me what you were planning and I'll make it."
He protested a bit, it was his house after all, and he didn't want her to have to do his job. He'd taken over the cooking chores shortly after the three of them had originally moved in, something Heather had appreciated, though sometimes he asked her to finish up what he'd already started. She'd cooked for over forty years, it was nice having her meals prepared for her for a change, but every now and then, in addition to the home baked goods she made every day for sale in the store, she really liked to just putter at the stove.
"Boone, you haven't seen Andrew all day, please go snorkelling with him." She enticed.
"Alright," he gave in, "Thanks."
They went upstairs to change into their swimsuits and grab their gear. Andrew was standing impatiently by the back door when Boone came back down, his fish identification book gripped tightly in his hand. Excitedly he pulled open the back door and ran across the deck and down the stairs.
He held up his hand so Boone could hold it as they crossed the road, once on the beach, he opened the book. There were actually only a few species of fish in the lake, but he brought the book down with him every time and rechecked the identifying details for bass, perch and lake trout. They'd once seen a sunfish, it'd been the one time he hadn't come armed with his 'reference library' and he'd been horribly disappointed.
"Maybe we'll see Buster." He looked up at his dad, "you think, Boone?"
Boone smiled down at him, "Maybe, bud." He'd named one of the bass in the lake, it had a chunk out of its' tail and a scar down its' side, Boone figured it must have had a close call with a motor boat, possibly even his own.
They waded out into the water and donned their gear, then moved over to the rocky part of the shore, quickly finding small pockets of fish amongst the boulders. They floated almost motionless, watching the denizens of the lake, as the indigenous inhabitants looked back up at them. Boone allowed himself the bizarre notion that he and Andrew were the ones on display here, the fish the actual observers.
Andrew suddenly caught sight of the fish he'd named Buster and quickly swam after the elusive creature, his swim fins propelling him quickly through the water. Boone kept up, watching warily; ready to stop him if they got too deep, but the fish followed the shoreline; then suddenly darted out into deeper water. Unexpectedly Andrew dove under the water for a closer look, Boone becoming a little concerned, stayed close.
He didn't knew exactly what had been going through Andrew's head when he did it, but suddenly he took a breath, and sucked a huge amount of water into his lungs. The combined panic of both of them suddenly flooding him, Boone dove down and snagged the boys' arm dragging him quickly to the surface, moving to stand at the same time, hoping that they weren't in over his head. He felt his feet connect with the bottom as his head broke the surface, the water coming to just below his shoulders. He ripped the mask and snorkel off of Andrew and held the boy while he coughed repeatedly, gasping for air with a horrible sound any time he could manage. He pulled his own gear off, while he alternately rubbed Andrews' back and thumped it.
He felt black edges start to encroach on his vision. 'Fuck no,' he pleaded with himself, putting up a barrier between his thoughts and Andrews'. 'Just keep it together. Boone Andrew Carlyle you can do this. Don't lose your shit.' He felt himself start to go over the edge, the events of the day just too much for his fragile psyche, the fact that he hadn't eaten anything all day just compounding the problem. He desperately tried to keep himself focused. 'You're such a fucking looser.' Suddenly, as his mind manufactured a coping mechanism, he imagined Shannon's voice in his head, denigrating him as she had so many times. 'You're going to kill you both one of these days,' her voice sneered at him. He clung to her unfair criticism, and fought back against it. 'You fucking bitch, leaving me alone to deal with this, raising him all by myself. I'll show you, you selfish whore.' He managed to work his fins off his feet without falling and submerging them both as he kept up the imaginary conversation in his head and headed for shore, relieved when the tactic seemed to work to keep him functioning, though he knew it was only going to be temporary.
Andrew slowly relaxed against him, finally, shaking terribly, he stopped coughing and just clung to Boone, the coughing changing to sobbing, his legs wrapped tightly around Boones' waist.
Reaching the beach, he knelt down carefully and sat Andrew on the ground, pulling away from him with difficulty. He was still crying quietly, but bit his lip and raised his head to look at his dad, "Sorry, Boone."
"For what?" he asked, pulling Andrew's fins off.
"I scared you, I didn't mean to," Andrew apologized. "I scared myself too." His face crumpled again, but he stopped crying.
"I know that, bud." He reached for a towel and held it out for the boy, trying to appear as if he was still in control of himself.
Andrew went to take it from him, his eyes widening as he looked at Boone's arm. "Your bracelet Boone, it's gone." He stared in horrid fascination at the word imprinted on Boone's left wrist, not at the scars, just at the tattoo of his mothers' name, the extra 's' and apostrophe clearly indicating possession. He'd certainly seen the tattoo before, but it seemed to be having more of an impact just now, probably given to the heightened emotional state he was in. Boone also remembered that stage one of the 'why did Shan leave us' cycle had started just the night before.
"Shit." Boone swore; it must have come off in the water. It didn't make any sense: he'd been swimming with the bracelet on for years without ever losing it. Maybe when he was pulling the masks off, he snagged it somehow. He didn't really give a flying fuck right now though; he was so close to just lying on the sand by Andrew's side and letting the blackness take over.
Andrew grabbed his hand and held it, just looking at the word at first; then tracing his thumb across it, before asking, "Find it, Boone, please?"
"Please bud it's only a bracelet. I can get another one." God let him let this go, please, Boone pleaded.
He shook his head vigorously, biting at his lip again, sobbing once.
Boone ground his teeth, and headed back out into the water, thinking all the time that this was a needle in a haystack one-shot chance. First he'd need his mask and snorkel though, and so headed back to where the original incident had played out. He spotted something on the bottom through the crystal clear water and dove under to grab it, coming up with Andrews' gear. He pressed the mask to his face awkwardly, not being able to pull the strap over his head as it was far too small for him, and dove under the water again. The bracelet was sitting in his own upturned mask on the bottom of the lake; he stared at it in stunned fascination. The odds, he wondered, what in the hell were the odds of that? He surfaced holding the bracelet up for Andrew to see, not wanting to let the boy into his head, given how tenuous his grip on his own sanity was right then. Pretty much running on empty, he gathered up the rest of their scattered gear and headed back to shore.
He grabbed his towel and threw it over his shoulder, then held his free hand out for the boy. He took it and stood then held his arms up, wanting to be carried, still shaken. Boone closed his eyes briefly, mustering some strength from somewhere, and leaned down, hooking his arm under Andrews' bottom, and lifting him onto his hip. He took a few unsteady steps up the beach; then took a deep breath, forcing one foot in front of the other.
The next thing he knew they were standing inside the back entrance of the house, both of them clad only in towels, he glanced through the window of the door, their suits were hanging neatly on the line. He'd done it all completely on autopilot.
Tom was sitting at the table, but looked up when he heard the door close. He took one look at them and knew that something had happened, standing he asked Boone what. For a second Boone looked at him like he wasn't quite sure exactly who he was, his eyes were a bit glazed and out of focus. Andrew had one arm wrapped around Boone's waist, and his head pressed against his side.
Boone blinked a few times, processing Toms' question, and rehearsed in his head what he was going to say, afraid if he opened his mouth and just let words pour out, he'd sound like a babbling idiot as he spewed self-recriminations, instead of answering what had been asked. "Andrew wanted to show me his guppy impression, but it turns out he can't breathe underwater quite as well as they can after all." He got it all out in one go.
Tom frowned, about to ask more, but Boones' eyes seemed to be pleading with him for something.
It took pretty much the last reserves of his strength, both physical and mental, but Boone formed the words, 'Take him upstairs' in his head and pushed them at the man as hard as he could, not sure he trusted himself to speak again. He'd been picking up little snippets of Tom and Heathers' thoughts over the past few months, though he hadn't said anything to them about it. He assumed his brain was becoming sensitive to their thought patterns after almost five years of living under the same roof. It was the same as how he and Shannon could read various members of their circle of friends from the survivors of Flight 815 depending on how close their relationship was with that particular person.
Toms' eyes widened a bit as he got the words along with a horrible feeling of being completely overwhelmed that made him feel immediately nauseous, knowing that both came from Boone. He tore his eyes away from Boones' as Boone swayed a bit on his feet.
He crossed the room quickly and took Andrews' hand, telling him that he'd start the shower for him, pulling him away from his father.
The boy looked up at his dad for confirmation, receiving a slight nod he let Tom usher him upstairs, taking a few glances back at Boone on the way.
As soon as they were out of sight, Boone's eyes rolled back into his head, and he crumpled to the floor.