A Dark Secret

And I was just about to say so when the whole thing went pear-shaped, and the much-heralded wild child, who rampaged like an animal, showed up to join us, as if from nowhere.

And it really was out of nowhere. I’d had absolutely no inkling. One minute he was sitting back on his heels admiring what he’d made – I had shuffled forwards on the sofa and muted the telly so I could inspect it too – and the next he was on his feet and, completely without warning, had karate-kicked a foot out to smash it to pieces – a full-on sideways thrust right at the middle of it with his bare foot.

‘I hate you!’ he screamed at it. ‘I hate you! I hate you!’ And once he’d reduced it to a pile of bricks again, he kicked at it some more, sending showers of bricks pinging all across the room.

‘Sam! What on earth’s wrong?’ I asked. ‘Why on earth have you done that? Your bridge was brilliant. Why would you smash it into pieces like that?’

He whirled to face me. ‘Cos it’s shit!’ he screamed, stabbing a finger towards the mess he’d made. ‘The colours got all wrong! This Lego is shit! I don’t want it! I hate it!’

‘The colours got wrong?’ I asked, keeping my voice low to try and calm things. ‘What d’you mean, love? The colours looked lovely to me.’

I should have known better than to disagree with him, because this only made him crosser. ‘The colours got wrong!’ he raged. Then, again without warning, he lunged at me, grabbed my hair and began pulling.

What a sight we must have looked to anyone passing by – me still perched on the sofa, Sam’s face at my eye level, pink-cheeked with fury, two clumps of my hair clutched tight in his fists. I could feel his warm breath puffing in angry gusts on my face.

‘I hate you! I hate you!’ he screamed, pulling harder, now kicking out with his feet at my shins as well. Thanking God for him being shoeless, I unfolded myself to standing, though with my head dipped, of necessity, to the level of his chest.

‘Sam, let go of my hair, please,’ I said through a veil of it.

In answer, he tugged harder. I put my hands over his. ‘Sam. Let go of my hair, please. Now.’

Another tug, this time accessorised by an eardrum-splitting scream. ‘Sam!’ I shouted, now forcibly unbending his fingers. ‘You need to listen to me. Let go this minute. Calm down!’

He was screaming at such a pitch now that I doubted he could even hear me. But my greater strength won out and I managed to free my hair. His own hands I hung on to though, tightly. What must this kind of assault be like if you were the same size as he was? Or smaller – Kelly’s fears for her poor kids were now making sense. And no wonder his own siblings were so scared of him.

‘Sam! Listen to me,’ I said firmly, holding his hands now in front of him. ‘I want to help you. I want to help you figure out what went wrong with your bridge. But I cannot do that – I cannot help you – while you’re this angry.’

His eyes were full of tears now. ‘It was the blues! It was the blues!’

I saw his leg twitch, and braced for another kick, but it didn’t come. I lowered my backside back onto the sofa so we were again face-to-face. ‘Okay, so that’s a start,’ I said. ‘Sam, look at me. Look at me. There. That’s a start. So, what about the blues? What exactly went wrong with them?’

‘There was a wrong one!’ His tone suggested he was incredulous that I could have missed it. ‘A blue one where there shouldn’t have been one! And I never did it! I did a red, then a white, then a blue, then a red again. But I never put two blues together. I never!’

Wow, I thought, he has misplaced a brick. That is all. ‘Ah, I see,’ I said. ‘Well, yes, I can see how that would make you cross. So perhaps it’s best if we put the bricks away for today, okay? So here’s what we’re going to do. We’re going to pick them all up, together, and put them back in the box. Then how about I see if I can find Fireman Sam on the telly?’

‘But I never did it!’ he squeaked at me. ‘I never!’

But I could tell from his changing body language that this was only the embers. The raging fire, quick to ignite, had died away equally quickly. I let go of his hands finally. He flexed and unflexed his fingers.

‘Come on,’ I said, getting down on my knees now. ‘Tell you what, shall we make it a race?’

In answer, he was down on his own knees in seconds, gathering. ‘Beat ya, beat ya, beat ya!’ he sang. ‘Gotcha, gonna eat ya!’

Which made little sense to me, but that was absolutely fine. The important thing was that the storm had passed as quickly as it had started. And at least we’d had it, which meant that we were at last up and running. And though I didn’t know to where, quite, with this tornado of a child, at least I had a better idea of what I was dealing with.

Chapter 4

If that one small incident opened a window to what Kelly might have been dealing with, the next couple of days saw me thrown headlong straight out of it, and onto what I had to concede was something fast approaching a battlefield. Life with Sam was definitely going to be no picnic. No wonder Kelly, with two little ones, had struggled to cope. Because it wasn’t just the screaming and the howling and the tantrums, and it wasn’t just the constant threat of violence when Sam exploded. It was that I just never saw them coming.

And they seemed destined to be a regular occurrence. That same afternoon, after Mike and Tyler had returned, I was in the kitchen, toiling away at a late-afternoon roast, when there was another major blow-up.

Sam had been watching TV while Mike and Tyler had been going over some college coursework, and, as the volume had been creeping up to a disruptive level, Mike had asked Sam if he could turn it down a little. He’d duly nodded – this was apparently no problem in itself, because he did as he was told immediately – but when he accidentally pressed the ‘change channel’ button, and lost the programme temporarily, it triggered a second bout of screaming and swearing and lashing out – this time, and just as I ran into the living room, by throwing the remote across the room in a fit of temper, catching Tyler a glancing blow across the face.

Mike was obviously quick to act, grabbing Sam up in a bear hug before he could lay hands on anything else to throw, and while Tyler heroically took the blow – in both senses – on the chin, Mike was already deploying the restraint technique we’d been trained in; using his superior strength to physically contain Sam while trying to quell the storm of his temper.

And what a whirlwind of a thing that temper was. Mike had his arms firmly around Sam, pinning his own to his sides, but I could see he was looking for any opportunity to attack, gnashing his teeth, and trying to get his mouth close enough to bite Mike, while kicking his feet out to try and kick him on the shins. Had he not been just nine – and such a scrap of a thing – it would have been a fearsome sight. As it was it just made me feel very sad.

While Tyler gathered up the batteries and put the remote back together, I went across to see if I could help. ‘Sam, until you stop that silly kicking and biting, Mike can’t let you go,’ I tried. ‘The way you are carrying on, you will hurt yourself, and we don’t want that to happen. We just want you to calm yourself down, okay? So stop yelling and take some deep breaths, please.’

But the only thing Sam was listening to was his anger, which seemed to be drowning all other sounds out. Eyes squeezed tight shut, he continued to wriggle and squirm. ‘Are you listening, mate?’ Mike asked. ‘You need to stop this, okay? Because I can’t let you go till you do.’

Mike shuffled back a little, towards the sofa, pulling Sam up onto his lap, speaking softly as he did so despite the heels hammering at his shins. ‘There we go, mate,’ he said, as he cradled and rocked him. ‘That’s better, you’re settling down now. Come on, shhhh, stop your fuss now, that’s it, in and out, take deep breaths.’

And, bit by bit, once again, the storm began to ebb away. Whether by will or exhaustion, I had no idea, but after ten minutes it appeared to have passed altogether, and once he was limp in Mike’s arms, his eyes finally open, I took a chance – those little feet could pack one heck of a punch – and knelt down in front of him on the carpet.

‘Sam, d’you want to talk?’ I asked. ‘About what made you angry?’

His eyes flicked past me to where Tyler was standing, holding the remote.

‘Stupid buttons!’ he said immediately. ‘The stupid buttons make me angry. They’re rubbish buttons,’ he added. ‘They’re just stupid.’

‘They’re just buttons, love,’ I pointed out. ‘Are they really worth getting in such a pickle about? Tell you what, how about Tyler sits down with you after dinner, and goes through what all the different buttons do with you? Would that help, do you think? Though for now, I think you first need to say sorry to him, don’t you?’

‘Mum, it’s fine,’ Tyler began. ‘He didn’t mean –’

‘Exactly. I didn’t mean to,’ Sam finished for him.

‘Nevertheless,’ I said, ‘it hit him, and you were the one who threw it. Which makes it a consequence of an action you took, Sam. Which is something I’d like you to think about, okay? And meanwhile, I’d better get back to the kitchen, or none of us will be getting any tea tonight, will we?’

Sam’s chin jutted as he looked at me, apparently astonished. ‘I’m allowed tea?’

‘Of course you are, mate,’ Mike said. He too took a chance and let his arms fall away. ‘Can’t have a little scrap like you starving, can we?’

Sam twisted round to look at him. ‘Even though I’m bad? I still get tea?’

I touched Sam gently on his head. His forehead was damp from his exertions, as was his hair. ‘Of course you get tea, silly. And you’re not bad, love,’ I said. ‘You’re just a little boy who gets angry quite a lot, and we’re going to all have to work together to help you with that. And we will. Though in the meantime’ – I got to my feet and put my hand out – ‘how about you come into the kitchen and help me with the veg, so Mike and Tyler can finish off what they’re doing?’

Sam managed a smile as he took my hand. ‘Are we having peas?’ he asked. ‘I could count them. I’m good at counting peas.’

I think we all chuckled in unison. ‘I’m not sure we actually need to count them,’ I told him. ‘But yes, if you want peas, we can definitely have peas. But first, are you going to say sorry to Tyler?’

‘Oh, yeah, sorry,’ he said. Then trotted off with me, happy as Larry. What a conundrum this little boy was.

I pondered the puzzle of Sam as I finished preparing dinner and, deprived of counting peas, he helped sort out the cutlery instead. Because it was a puzzle. There being no unhappy aftermath to Sam’s violent outbursts – at least so far – was interesting in itself. As had been the case earlier in the day, once Sam was over his anger, it was as if he’d forgotten all about it. No contrition. No regret. But no sullen defiance either. Though he’d been genuinely astonished that he was still going to be fed after what he’d done (which meant he definitely understood we had issues about his behaviour), his own ‘moral compass’ – his personal landscape of what was and wasn’t acceptable – seemed oddly absent. Whereas most kids, even the most damaged, out-of-control kids, had an understanding that their behaviour negatively impacted on others (more often than not, that was precisely why they did it), it almost seemed as if Sam rationalised them on a ‘what’s done is done’ basis. Since he had no problem brushing them off once they were over – and forgetting them completely – it didn’t seem to occur to him that we wouldn’t too. I was no psychologist, but I found Sam’s psychology fascinating. It was as if he was living in the moment, but to the nth degree. So much so that it was as if his previous rages hadn’t even happened.

Yet, happen they had, and happen they did again. And, over the next twenty-four hours, they happened at regular intervals. Without warning, the slightest thing could tip him over into a raging, yelling bundle of fury. Because the eggs and soldiers hadn’t been set out the same way as yesterday. Because he’d coloured over the lines in the colouring-in book I’d given him. Because someone on Fireman Sam didn’t do what Sam thought he should do. By the time Monday evening came around, I looked as if I’d done a few rounds myself – in a boxing ring with Anthony Joshua.

‘We can’t allow this to continue,’ Mike said once we’d put Sam to bed that evening, after another flare-up over some nonsense or other. Yet another episode during which I’d had a fistful of hair grabbed.

‘I know,’ I said. ‘I’d be tearing my own hair out, but he’s busy doing it for me. I’ll be flipping bald soon, at this rate!’ I felt my scalp, which was so tender that I winced as I touched it. ‘I just wish I could get a handle on his triggers.’

‘Sure you’re not just clutching at straws?’ Mike said. ‘Because from what I’ve seen and you’ve described, anything could be a trigger. He’s just in max on-the-edge mode, twenty-four seven. How can we get to the bottom of something we can’t see coming?’

Yet, for all that Mike was right (he had to be – how else to explain the rages?) when he wasn’t flying off the handle Sam was no trouble at all. Quite the opposite, in fact. Though I’d been anxious that Tyler would lose his rag sooner or later, when I’d gently probed him about Sam (he was now out for the evening) he’d laughed it all off, apparently genuinely.

‘It’s obviously going to be like living with a little cyclone,’ he’d admitted. ‘But as long as he doesn’t touch my stuff I can live with it.’

‘Seriously?’ I’d asked. After the troubles we’d had with Miller, I was anxious above anything that we didn’t have a re-run. Happy as I was to take on Sam, it just wouldn’t be fair.

‘Seriously,’ he’d reassured me. ‘I know it’s going to sound weird, Mum, but I quite like him. He’s sweet.’

And though I knew Mike wasn’t convinced yet, what Tyler had said had struck a chord with me. Bottom line was that I liked Sam too. Which was no way a requisite for caring for him and doing my best for him, but it was a happy extra fact. And a welcome one, too. Whatever else it was, it was a plus point, because we were at the start of a journey that could end up as rocky as many others I’d already taken. A little stock of goodwill and sympathy would be a big bonus.

‘You’re right,’ I agreed with Mike now, ‘but, you know, even only forty-eight hours in, I feel we’re already gathering pieces of the jigsaw. His comment about being fed when he’d been “bad” – that was telling, for instance. No, I know it’s not earth-shattering knowing he was probably punished by being denied food, but it’s something, isn’t it? Not a lot, but something. And all the kicking, biting, hair-pulling – that doesn’t just come from nowhere. It’s learned behaviour. As is all the dog stuff. I think I need to do some comprehensive note-taking with this one, because although it all seems kind of random in the moment, we might just find a pattern if we record everything.’

I could see from Mike’s expression that he knew I was on a roll. But I could also see that he wasn’t yet rolling with me. ‘Well okay, love, I guess you know what you’re doing, but it’s one thing him attacking us and Ty, but what about when the grandkids come round? Have you thought about that?’

‘Of course I have,’ I sniffed. ‘I can’t believe you’ve even asked that. In fact, I filled Riley and Kieron in this afternoon, before you got home. And, yes, I’ve pre-warned them that things might be a little sticky in the short term, but it’s not like we’re going to have them round here and leave them alone with him unsupervised. And, besides, Levi and Jackson are both older than Sam – and stronger, don’t forget. I doubt he’d give them any nonsense. I doubt he’d dare. And as for the girls –’

‘Case, there you go. That’s exactly what I’m getting at. It’s all well and good dealing with it after the fact, but in the meantime one of the kids might have been frightened or even hurt, and we can’t ask them not to come to the house, can we? I just think we need to be clear that Sam poses a risk to them, and be upfront about how – and if – we want to manage that. I don’t think either of us want a re-run of Miller. No, I know we don’t, in fact.’

I didn’t like the turn this conversation was taking. Not one bit. ‘So you’re saying we shouldn’t commit to Sam yet?’

‘No, I’m not saying that. I’m just saying – and don’t throw a cushion at me, okay? – that we should be clear that if Sam continues with these violent outbursts there is a line to be drawn, and we’re not going to cross it. That our grandkids being safe here with any foster kid is non-negotiable. One thing you being covered in bruises, because you’re tough as nails, you are, but quite another it happening to them. Isn’t that fair?’ He looked at me pointedly.

Which he had a right to. I’d bent his ear enough about Miller, after all. He knew more than anyone just how close I’d come to throwing in the fostering towel with him. So perhaps he was just pre-empting things; looking out for me.

But I was gung-ho. I don’t know why, but I just felt I could get a handle on Sam – get through to him, autism or no autism. ‘Oh, stop looking for problems that may not exist, love.’ I grinned at him. ‘You know I hate when you do that.’

Mike laughed. ‘No, love, what you hate is when I touch on your own fears. You know as well as I do that this could be a real issue.’

As I went to put the kettle on I felt an overwhelming urge to let out a growl myself, because what I hated even more than that was admitting that Mike was right, and I might be wrong.

So I’d just have to prove him wrong, wouldn’t I?

Chapter 5

It felt a little like saying hello to an old friend. Not in reality; all the previous examples in my life had long gone now, along with the children with whom I’d made them. But in gathering what I’d need to make a chart for Sam – the stickers, the paper, the array of felt pens – I felt the warm glow of re-acquaintance with a cherished buddy.

When was the last time I’d set about my job with my old friend to support me? Too long, it seemed to me. Much too long. If I’d been slightly stung by Christine’s opinion of our points system when I’d first met her, now I was even more zealous. And because it had been her suggestion that we try helping Sam within its framework, I also felt vindicated – which made me even more determined to prove the naysayers wrong. For some children, in some circumstances, positive and structured behaviour modification was the key to unlock the potential for better lives.

That we needed to access that key in Sam was increasingly obvious. We knew almost nothing about him yet, and I doubted we would for a few days more, but whatever the underlying issues for his various behaviours, helping him to find ways to quash them before they completely took hold of him would be essential if we were to try and help him come to terms with his situation and his past.

Whatever that past might turn out to be. We were three days in now and still I knew nothing of his history. He’d offered nothing either, and I’d decided not to press. Instead, after another day spent mostly fire-fighting his tantrums, I had made copious notes, both in my head and in my journal. And having assembled all my equipment, I now sat and read through the latter, marking the ones which I felt we should prioritise; not just the obvious issue of him lashing out in anger (obviously the main one) but also personal care, household chores and an array of social niceties that, when implemented, would add that positive bit of structure to his days.

It wasn’t as simple a business as might be expected, however. With children like Sam, a list of ‘don’t dos’ and ‘you must dos’ would be useless. The most effective way to deal with undesirable behaviours (such as anger, quick temper or being fast-reactive) was to put tasks into place that he could readily do but required patience, thought and determination. It would be a slow process – as with Rome, desired behaviours really weren’t built in a day – but the ongoing sense of achievement, built in lots of small ways, would hopefully see those negative behaviours begin subsiding.

But first Sam needed concrete incentives. If he didn’t understand that he was doing anything wrong, then, without being offered something in return, why would he change? Again, this wouldn’t necessarily be a simple thing to achieve, because the usual trade of ‘do this and you’ll get that’ generally didn’t work well with children at Sam’s intellectual/emotional level. So it was more about giving him control. If we established the things he wanted, and gave him options for ways to get them, then he could choose to work towards them. If he wanted a takeaway pizza at the weekend, he could be proactive in trying to earn one – choosing to do the tasks necessary for him to be rewarded.

Or not. Though the ‘not’ bit wasn’t part of the plan. Not initially. Nor were his undesirable behaviours. Where more emotionally robust children could cope with losing points as well as earning them, and, as a consequence, try harder after precious ‘ticks’ had been lost, other children – the most vulnerable – would react very differently; one ‘failure’ would immediately send them into a spin, thinking (because negative thinking can be such an ingrained behaviour) that they had failed, period, and that all was now lost. And this in itself would lead to more ‘bad’ behaviour.

So it was all about keeping things positive – if Sam didn’t feel like doing a chore, or was too busy acting up to finish one, he could simply regroup and try again for it the next day.

And, having had the green light from Christine, even before I’d met him, I’d prepared for Sam’s arrival with this kind of behaviour modification already in mind. Which was why, before he got to us, I had already done some of the work necessary to put my plans into action; the bedroom he’d been given was already free of the two things that (sad to say, some would say, but this was the real world, in this world) I knew could be used as inducements, namely the small television that habitually resided there and, usually attached to it, Kieron’s old Xbox. Given what I’d observed in the days Sam had been with us, these two items would, I knew, provide incentives.

But now the real work began. After a third morning in which Sam had howled in bed for half an hour, I’d brought him down for breakfast (Mike and Tyler having gone to work and college) and, once we’d eaten, had allowed him to watch TV in the living room while I gathered my equipment on the dining table.

Now I drained my coffee and suggested he might like to come and join me, to play a game I thought he might enjoy.

‘It’s a special game,’ I told him, as I pulled a dining chair out for him to sit on. ‘One where the idea is to make life a bit easier for you.’

He sat as instructed and eyed all the paper and pens. ‘Are we doing colouring in?’ he asked. ‘Shall I draw you a fire engine?’

‘Not yet,’ I said, ‘but we can after this, if you like. No, what I thought we could do first of all is find out what things you would really like.’ I picked up my pen. ‘And when you tell me, I can make a list of them.’

Sam’s hand shot up immediately, just as it might in a classroom. ‘A dog,’ he enthused. ‘I really, really want a dog.’

My heart sank just a little. Not the best of starts, obviously. Since having our first foster child, Justin – when Bob, our dog, had been at risk of serious harm – having a pet in the house had become a no-no. So Bob (now in doggy heaven) had gone to live his life out with Kieron. But Kieron now had another dog, a little Westie called Luna. ‘Not a dog, sweetie. We can’t have a dog here, I’m afraid. But shall I tell you something? My son Kieron has a dog. If you’d like to we could certainly go and visit him.’