"You! You're one of them!" Samantha Keita said, angrily. "Sorry. Not interested." She turned her wheelchair around and started to leave.
"Samantha Elisabeth!" Joseph called. "Turn that chair around and get back here this instant and remember your manners!"
Sam clinched her jaw and with steely determination returned to her spot.
"For your information, young lady, Mr. Monk is not one of them. He is one of us."
"But he…"
"He is a brilliant detective from San Francisco - who was attending the conference because his wife is soon to give birth to their child - a child who has Down Syndrome. He just found out." Keita said.
Sam became quiet. "Oh. You're a parent."
"Yes. Natalie is due in two months." Monk nodded.
Sam felt embarrassed.
"Awe, geez. And I…" she fumbled. "Well…I thought you were, um…I... uh..sorry about the water." she said insecurely.
Monk shook his head, not really knowing how to react as he was still processing the revelation that his assailant was Joseph Keita's daughter.
Joseph smirked. "Now that we've cleared that up, how much longer is your game, Pookie?"
"Papa!"
"How much longer?"
"We're in the bottom of the ninth." She replied.
"Very well. Go ahead and finish up and come back to see us. I'd like to take Mr. Monk on a walk, if that's alright."
She smiled. "Sure thing, pops!"
Twenty minutes later the three adults were walking along the tree-lined walk enjoying the warm late April sun. Joseph walked on one side of his daughter as she rolled along in her motorized chair and Monk walked on the other. Keita explained to Adrian that he had brought him to this place because he wanted to tell him a story that he would only be able to understand if he saw it himself. He said he once was in a position very much like where Adrian found himself today and he felt he could help him.
"Sam came into our lives when I was thirty years old." Joseph explained.
"Twenty-nine, Eleven months, four days." Sam responded, as she wheeled around a curve.
"I was rounding."
"Then you should have rounded to twenty-nine."
Monk chuckled as he was immediately reminded of conversations between himself and his brother Ambrose. Ah, family!
Joseph laughed. "Did I tell you that Sam is a numbers freak?"
"No." Adrian replied.
"Yes, my daughter has a fixation with three things, numbers, sports and boys."
Sam looked at Adrian. "I can calculate the trajectory of any thrown item in five seconds and as long as it's within thirty feet, I can hit it within an inch."
"Impressive." Monk said. "Like water?"
She ducked her head. "I said I was sorry."
"I know, I know." Monk said. "I was just – bantering. My wife likes to – banter. We - banter. It means I like you."
She smiled. " Thank you. But seriously, I'm not Dak Prescott or anything, but I do pretty well." She quipped.
Monk looked lost. "Who is Dak Prescott?"
Sam raised her hand to her forehead "You don't know?"
Monk turned to Keita and shrugged.
Keita winked. "Dak Prescott is the quarterback..."
"STAR quarterback." she interjected.
"...star quarterback for the Dallas Cowboys, Sam's favorite team. Dak is Sam's favorite player."
"He's hot." she whispered.
Monk sighed with recognition. "Oh, American football. My father, Jack…Monk's a Cowboys fan. He thinks they're rad."
Sam looked at her father and mouthed "Rad?"
"Yeah. He lives in Midland. He's a truck driver. Semi-retired. But, I think he still delivers some merchandise to them every now and then."
"Really? Do you think he knows Dak?" she asked.
"Well, I don't…"
"Samantha..."
Sam sighed. "Was just asking."
"I know, but that's really not why he's here." Joseph replied.
"She's fine." Monk responded. "I have an older daughter around her age, Julie. I can dig that scene."
Sam smiled.
"As I was saying," Joseph continued, "I was in my late twenties and Sam's mother was a year younger than myself. We met in Montreal 32 years ago, where we both lived at the time when I was a foreign exchange student."
"She worked in a museum." Sam added.
"Yes. The Montreal Museum of Natural History. We hit it off right away. Got married. A year later we were blessed with a beautiful baby girl."
"Me!" Sam smiled. Joseph touched her shoulder endearingly.
"Life couldn't have been better." Joseph said. "She was the perfect baby. Happy. Smiled all the time. Let us sleep through the night. Just perfect.
My wife's sister, Camille, had a baby around the same time, Sam's cousin Rachel. She lived in Jackman, Maine and would come visit us fairly often. We have pictures of the two girls together and they almost look like twins. We imagined moving back to the States, having our children grow up together, going to the same schools, enjoying the same things."
"What happened?" Monk asked.
"What happened?" he asked.
"He means how did I end up in a wheelchair?" Sam asked.
"Yes. Was there an accident?"
"No. No accident." She replied. "I was born with Cerebral Palsy."
"Oh, I see."
"Sam was around nine months old when she was diagnosed. We had noticed on Camille's visits that Rachel was rolling over and sitting up on her own while Sam was not. We figured that every child is different so didn't think much about it until around eight months of age, Rachel had started to crawl, was actually standing with support and Sam was still a bit…"
"Floppy." Samantha said with a grin. "They said holding me was almost like holding a doll."
"Samantha could hold her head up and sit, if we supported her, but was really making no moves toward wanting to move around or craw. She was behind on several of the other milestones we were seeing Rachel achieve. Naturally, that concerned us and we ended up taking Sam to a doctor in Hampstead, Quebec, where we lived at the time. He ordered a CT scan, made the diagnosis, and our world was changed. We discovered we were the parents of a child with special needs.
Of course, he gave us the grimmest of prospects. He said she would probably never speak or walk or go to school. She'd be dependent upon us for everything. My wife would have to give up her job; and, while there was a law in Quebec at the time designed to help integrate disabled people into the community, it had no teeth and she would likely never have any socialization outside of our family circle."
Monk shook his head as he took it all in. "How did you handle that? I mean, I imagine that you felt – overwhelmed."
"We were." Joseph took a deep breath. "And, as far as we handled it, probably not as well as we should have. Cynthia cried. I withdrew and went about like a mad man trying to 'fix' everything. I ran for city council to advocate for them to have more services for the disabled. I didn't win. I lobbied hospitals. Tried to do anything I could to right what I saw as a wrong.
Cynthia tried to get me to talk about it but I would tell her everything was fine and to just let me do my job. I felt it was my job as the dad to provide for my family and that was what I was doing. For a time, things were not altogether pleasant in our house."
"That was until Big Mama set you straight." Sam interjected.
"Big mama?" Adrian asked.
Joseph smiled. "Cynthia's grandmother. Wise old Indian woman from Lawton, Oklahoma."
"Mama's Comanche." Sam said. Adrian smiled.
"We brought Sam to see her when Sam was about two years old..."
Sam cleared her throat.
"Okay, twenty-seven months. Big Mama, who was in her late nineties at the time, held our girl for the longest time and rocked her. Then she turned to us both with the sweetest smile and she said the most amazing thing. She said, 'You must be very special that the Creator has entrusted you with so great a gift.' She said, 'Enjoy her. She is a tender reed now. Water her with salty tears and she will shrink and wither like an untended vine; but, nourish her with strength and love and she will grow – far beyond what you can imagine– and so will you.'
I can't tell you why, but what she said changed me. I decided the path I was on was not helping my daughter or our marriage and so Cynthia and I got together and decided to let go of what we thought we wanted at the time, accept what was, and devote our lives to ensuring our daughter would have as good of a life as we could give her."
"And what happened then?" Monk asked.
Joseph shook his head. "We found out that what we thought we wanted, wasn't what we really wanted. And rather than giving her a good life, we've all been given a greater life with Sam than we ever thought possible. We discovered that many times, doctors don't know what they are talking about for she has far exceeded anything they said she would ever be able to do. Sure, there are struggles. Hospital visits…" he raised his eyebrow. "The occasional trip to bail her out of jail…" He cleared his throat.
Samantha lowered her head to hide her smile.
"But I wouldn't change a thing about her or our lives today. This remarkable young woman has become, quite simply, the greatest gift that I or my wife have ever known."
Monk swallowed back emotion as he saw the love between Joseph and his daughter.
"You really are blessed to have such a relationship." Monk replied, "But…Oh...nevermind."
He shook his head. He didn't wish to impose.
"Did you have a question, Adrian?" Joseph asked. "Don't be afraid. We're open here."
Adrian clasped his hands in front of his face and pondered how he should phrase his next question. He didn't want Sam to feel on the spot in front of her dad; and yet, he still needed to know. "I…I think it's wonderful you have that kind of relationship and I know you said that you wouldn't want to change her. I get that. But, I guess I want to hear from Sam since this is her life." Monk said.
"Sure. Ask me anything." She said.
"Well, I…I know I'm not going to say this right, but if somehow medical science could…if they could come up with a cure of some sort or be able to go in and change that which keeps you in the chair…"
"You mean if they could 'fix' me?" she asked.
"I…I really didn't want to say it that way." He said.
"But, that's what you were thinking." She said.
"Please don't be offended." he replied, awkwardly.
She smiled. "I'm not offended. It's a common misconception and since you're new to this, I really don't expect you to understand just yet. But, before I answer, I'd like to thank you for inviting me into the conversation. That's what the whole protest was about. Those bunch of 'geniuses' up there at Massachusetts General are all salivating over 'fixing' this disorder or that ailment or this hereditary trait and the vast majority have never spent five minutes talking to the population that they are trying to fix. If they did, they wouldn't like what they'd hear. We don't want to be fixed because you don't fix what isn't broken."
Monk tilted his head. "What do you mean?"
"I mean most people don't even understand me enough to be making any kind of judgment calls concerning my welfare. I get people who come up to me and talk to me like I'm a baby or treat me like I'm slow. I hate that! I'm not slow." she said.
"Not at all." Monk replied.
"And then, some will come up to me when I'm in the wheelchair and look at me all sad and everything and say something like 'sweet child, I'm going to pray for you that God will change your situation.' I mean understand that they mean well and I love Jesus and believe in the power of prayer too; but, I'm the way God made me and I'm a good person who enjoys my life, so why would I want to change?"
"So, you could do some of the things you can't do?" Monk suggested. "Don't you want to be able to do more?"
"How can I explain this?" She thought for a moment as Monk took a seat on a bench next to her. Joseph sat beside him.
"Do you like sports?" she asked.
Monk shrugged. "No, not really. I mean, I can watch them but I don't follow them. I was into track growing up."
"Track. Okay. I can work with that. Can you run a mile in 3 minutes 43.13 seconds?" she asked.
Monk chuckled. "No. Not even close."
"Well, Hicham El Guerrouj can. He holds the world record. How about this - can you scale Everest?"
Monk shook his head. "No. I don't have the stamina any more that I used to. Plus...I'm afraid of heights…and wind…I hear it's very windy up there. Oh, and avalanches…I need to have Natalie add that to the list…avalanches are very bad."
"Well, you can't do what 5,788 other people on this planet have done. Nor, can you jump out of an airplane, or probably race in the Indy 500, or be the king of England or any number of things."
"My inadequacies are many. Thank you for highlighting them."
"You're missing my point." Sam said. "Name something that you'd really love to be able to do but you can't. Something you're just not physically able to do."
"Cure my son."
"Something besides that." She replied. "Something many others can do. Something that might surprise me."
He thought for a moment. "Drink milk?"
"There you go, you can't...wait…you can't drink milk?"
"No…I can't. I'm afraid of things that go through cow utters."
"Well, that's just weird. Something else."
"Okay. Let's see." he said beginning to count with his fingers. "There's germs, heights, snakes, mushrooms, puppets, water from the tap, dark, spiders…"
"Wait…"
"Crowds, nature…"
"Wait, what are you doing?" she asked.
"Listing the things I'm afraid of. I have a lot…of phobias. Needles, dentists, lightning."
"Stop! Just stop! You're proving my point!" she replied.
"I am?"
"Yes. You am." She said.
"But, how?"
"You have this whole list of things that you can't do, many of which I'm sure you'd want to. But, you don't let that keep you from living your life. You might get frustrated now and then, like I do occasionally, but you don't dwell on the bad - and as such, you live a full and satisfying life. Just like me."
Adrian looked at her gently and smiled taking note of the lesson she was teaching him.
Sam looked up at her father and motioned with her head. "Papa, would you mind leaving me and Mr. Monk alone for a few minutes? I want to show him around campus."
Keita smiled and nodded. "Yes, dear. I think I will just go see if Ms. Hope is around."
"She should be in her office." She replied.
"Okay." He stopped and touched Adrian's arm. "Don't let her get you into any trouble."
.
"Mr. Monk, come with me. I want to introduce you to some folks." Sam said after her father walked away.
Monk followed her nervously. "Is this a party we're going to, because I don't really…like…parties."
"No, it's not a party." She replied.
"Good. I'm afraid of parties. I mean I can do them. Particularly if Natalie throws them. My wife throws good parties. But, generally, I avoid them."
"No party, Mr. Monk. Just relax."
They made their way down the path to the newer building and through the doors via the ramp. Sam pressed a button which held the door open and soon they found themselves in a classroom where one teacher was working with four very young students, each of whom had one or two adults with them.
"That's Miss Beverly." She explained. "She is teaching the parents and children how to sign. Each of them was born deaf, but the school opens up opportunities for parents who work to come in with their kids so they can learn the skills they will need to adapt to their disability in the outside world. Kendra is the little African American girl on the left. Both of her parents are deaf – her father due to an illness he contracted when a child and her mother from birth. They knew that there was a risk that any child of theirs would be born deaf as well; but they didn't think twice about it. Deafness is just a part of their culture and they're cool with how things are.
Walking a little further down, they poked their head into a room where a child was bouncing up and down on what appeared to be bungie ropes. The smile on her face warmed Monk's heart.
"What's going on here?" he asked.
"That is Rashida. She's like me. They are working on strengthening her core muscles and flexibility." She replied. "When papa first found House of Hope there wasn't as much in terms of therapy as they have today, but we took part in it all. Speech therapy. Physical therapy. I even did a pilates class when I was a teen. Eventually, I was able to play baseball (I was a pitcher before I was an umpire), wheelchair football, and even did a little acting."
"That's amazing." Monk replied, taking it all in. "You're a very special young woman."
"Yes, I am. But we're all special in our own way and every one of us has a place and a role to play. That's one of the key things that ticked me off about the conference."
"What's that?"
"Well, today all we ever hear about everywhere is diversity, diversity, diversity. We have this group and that group and a real dogma surrounding the idea that everyone should be accepted for who they are. But, from where I am sitting, it's just an idea. In practice, many don't mean it.
I mean, take this conference. First, they didn't invite any disabled people to their round table because they knew that a lot of us would say, 'no, don't change us. We're fine with who we are and we're happy.' That doesn't matter to them because for them to them we're not fully human or something, or at least not up to their standards for humanity. It's not about what's best for us or what we want. It's about what they think is best and too often the answer to that is a world without a lot of us. They are quite literally trying to figure ways to 'edit us out 'of existence and make the world, not a place of diversity but a place of uniformity. If they can't edit us out, they encourage others to abort us out so that one day there will be none of us left. And I can tell you right now, that would be a sad, sad, world."
Monk watched the passion that Sam exhibited when advocating for herself and others and he marveled at the fact that as much as he loved things being the same, the world that she was describing in which there wasn't a variety of different kinds of people was one that he would never want to be a part of. It had taken many years of life, personal healing and a woman named Natalie; but Monk finally understood that a rainbow needed its many colors. That's what made it beautiful.
Before they left, Sam had one more stop for them to make. Exiting the newer building, they went under an overhang and entered the practice room in the old mansion where a choir was assembled. The children ranged from around eleven years old to nineteen and were of various disabilities. Leading the choir was a young man in his early twenties with short dark hair. When he turned around, Monk took in a short breath when he realized the director had Down Syndrome.
He watched as the young man nodded toward a young lady at the piano who also appeared to be affected by the disorder. And, when she began to play You Raise Me Up and the choir began to sing, he became mesmerized by the music, by their talent, by their dedication to the task, and with the choir director who kept perfect timing, who flawlessly brought each section in at the right points in time and whose infectious smile alone lit up the room. The whole scene filled him with hope. But it's what Sam said next that caused his jaw to drop.
While the choir launched into the second verse, she leaned over and whispered to Monk "That's Sharon Hope's son." Monk smiled and nodded an acknowledgement remembering Dr. Green had mentioned that Sharon had a Down's child. Sam continued. "The young lady playing the piano, that's his fiancée, Becky. They're getting married next year."
He turned to her. "Married?"
"Yeah. They are part of a small but growing percentage of adults with Down Syndrome are choosing to marry. They met here at the center as kids and have been best friends ever since. When he isn't working here, he works at a hardware store and she works at a hotel. Obviously they are both highly functioning adults and Sharon taught them...she taught us all, as did our parents, to not let anything hold us back from what we really wanted to do. It may take a little time to get there and we may go via the 'scenic route' as they say - but disabled children are almost always able to do more than people give them credit for and a lot of the time that means what the able-bodied kids do as well. Never underestimate what love and encouragement will do for your child. He will surprise you at every turn, I guarantee."
Natalie made it back home mid-afternoon and waited for Adrian to arrive. She rehearsed a speech about how she was going to continue to be patient as he worked through some things but how she wanted for them to work on these things together for their son. She did a little house cleaning and then fed the kids and continued to think through scenarios in her mind of how the conversation should go, but when it was seven-thirty and he wasn't home, she began to get worried. Lee and Abby watched as she paced the floor. They looked at each other and Lee looked at his sister and just shook his head.
Eight o'clock arrived and she got the kids ready for bed. She read them a short story and turned out the light then immediately rushed to her cell phone when it rang. Looking at the display, she saw it was Julie.
"Hello?"
"Hey, Mom. I was just calling to tell you if you're worried about dad, don't. He's on his way home."
She closed her eyes and sighed. "You've heard from him?"
Julie's smile could be heard through the phone. "Yeah, I did better than that. I saw him. He left here about ten minutes ago. Just hang tight. He'll be there soon."
Natalie hung up the phone and went into the kitchen, not sure if she should make him dinner or leave it alone. Finally, she turned on the tea kettle and poured herself a calming cup of peppermint tea, trying to get her emotions in order.
At 8:55 PM, she heard his car door shut outside. Straightening her maternity top, she primped in front of a mirror like it was their first date and then tried to look as casual as she could. The door opened.
"Natalie! Sweetheart? Where are you? I have the most wonderful news!" he called from the front door.
"In here." she responded, sitting on a stool by the counter. She nearly toppled off when he appeared. There he stood in his overcoat and hat with a box of candy in one hand and roses in the other, his face aglow with excitement."
"Darling! I'm so happy you're back!" he said, nearly giddy as he wrapped her in an embrace and kissed her on the lips. "I missed you so much!"
She laughed. "But, I wasn't even gone a day!" she said, taking the candy and roses from him.
"I know. But I still missed you. Oh, Sweetheart! I have the most marvelous news! I can't wait to share it!"
Natalie sat the chocolates down on the counter. "Okay? What is it?"
"He's going to be okay! Our son, he's going to be okay!" he said, taking his hat off and sitting it by the table.
She watched in wonder as he continued.
"I went to the most marvelous place and saw some of the most wonderful people and I learned the most wonderful things and I learned something new. I've been looking at this the wrong way."
"You have?" she asked getting down from her stool to get a vase for the roses.
"Yes. I went to the House of Hope. I know I should have gone with you yesterday and I'll explain later why I didn't, but Natalie, I had no idea what I missed. I've been looking at this as if our baby is broken and that I somehow needed to 'fix' him." He laughed. "He's not broken, sweetheart! He's exactly how God made him to be and he is going to be a blessing. He IS a blessing! And you know what else? He's not going to be alone and he's going to be accepted and encouraged and we're going to care for him and make sure he never feels unwanted like I did. He's going to have other children to play with that won't make fun of him and, Natalie, I know we will have some struggles, but we're going to make it through and he's going to be happy..." he paused and clasped his hands. "Our boy is going to be happy and he's going to be loved - which is all I ever really wanted for him - for him to be happy and loved and it's going to be that way because...because, you know we love him already and he's ours and ...oh,Natalie...I'm so relieved! He's going to be okay. Our boy is going to be just fine!" he began to cry. "He's going to be happy and fine." Natalie stopped what she was doing and held him tightly and together they stood that way for a long time.
Finally, she pulled back a little and ran her hand through his curls and then took his face in her hands and kissed him passionately. Responding immediately, he pulled her as tight to himself as he dared and deepened the kiss. As their lips parted he looked at her with love, "What was that for?"
She smiled, kissed the tip of his nose and then returned to the roses. "For getting it - like I knew you eventually would. My brilliant man. You always come through when it..." she stopped. "Hey. Do you know there are eleven roses here?"
"Yes." he responded, biting his lip. "Is that a problem?"
"Well...it's just. Normally, you buy ten." she replied.
He looked at her and his eyes twinkled. "I know. But, I was thinking what the heck. Live a little and get her another rose. Sometimes one extra of something is not really a bad thing at all."