The Rescue - Nicholas Sparks [61]
The carnival was still going strong, however—mainly kids and their parents, hoping to enjoy the last couple of hours of entertainment that the carnival would provide. By tomorrow everything would be loaded up and on its way to the next town.
“So, Kyle, what do you want to do?” Denise asked.
He immediately pointed to the mechanical swing—a ride in which dozens of metal swings rotated in circles, first forward and then backward. Each child had his or her own seat—supported at each corner by a chain—and kids were screaming in terror and delight. Kyle watched it going round and round, transfixed.
“It’s a swing,” he said. (Ess a sweeng)
“Do you want to ride the swing?” Denise asked him.
“Swing,” he said with a nod.
“Say, ‘I want to ride the swing.’ ”
“I want to ride the swing,” he whispered. (Wonta wide ee sweeng)
“Okay.”
Denise spotted the ticket booth—she’d saved a few dollars from her tips the evening before—and began to reach into her purse. Taylor, however, saw what she was doing and raised his hands to stop her.
“My treat. I asked, remember?”
“But Kyle . . .”
“I asked him to come, too.”
After Taylor bought the tickets, they waited in line. The ride stopped and emptied, and Taylor handed over the tickets to a man who’d come straight from Central Casting. His hands were black with grease, his arms covered in tattoos, and one of his front teeth was missing. He tore the tickets before dropping them into a locked wooden box.
“Is this ride safe?” she asked.
“Passed inspection yesterday,” he answered automatically. No doubt it was the same thing he said to every parent who asked, and it didn’t do much to relieve her anxiety. Parts of the ride looked as if they were stapled together.
Nervously Denise led Kyle to his seat. She lifted him up, then lowered the safety bar for him as Taylor stood outside the gate, waiting for them.
“Ess a swing,” Kyle said again, once he was ready to go.
“Yes, it is.” She put his hands on the bar. “Now hold on and don’t let go.”
Kyle’s only response was to laugh in delight.
“Hold on,” she said again, more seriously this time, and Kyle squeezed the bar.
She walked back to Taylor’s side and took her place, praying that Kyle would listen to her. A minute later it started, and the ride slowly began to pick up speed. By the second rotation the swings were beginning to fan out, carried by their momentum. Denise hadn’t taken her eyes off Kyle, and as he swung by, it was impossible not to hear him laughing, a high-pitched giggle. As he came back around, she noticed that his hands were still right where they should be. She breathed a sigh of relief.
“You seem surprised,” Taylor said, leaning close so his voice could be heard over the noise of the ride.
“I am,” she said. “It’s the first time he’s ever been on a ride like this.”
“Haven’t you ever taken him to a carnival?”
“I didn’t think he was ready for one before.”
“Because he has trouble talking?”
“Partially.” She glanced at him. “There’s a lot about Kyle that even I don’t understand.”
She hesitated under Taylor’s serious gaze. Suddenly she wanted more than anything for Taylor to understand Kyle, she wanted him to understand what the last four years had been like. More than that, she wanted him to understand her.
“I mean,” she began softly, “imagine a world where nothing is explained, where everything has to be learned through trial and error. To me, that’s what Kyle’s world is like right now. People sometimes think that language is just about conversation, but for children, it’s much more than that. It’s how they learn about the world. It’s how they learn that burners on the stove are hot, without having to touch them.