Animal Bonding (Tomer)

[Joshua Bernstein]

This was Josh's third year attending the community field day, and his first with children. He thought it was amusing that he not only now had a foster daughter along with him, but also his nephew. It was surprising that he had agreed to come, given his perplexingly reclusive nature, but Josh wasn't gone to question his good fortune, at least not unless Sean was involved.

So he found himself with Sean and with two children, a situation he had never expected to be in, but one that he found great delight in.

Of course, he wished that Tomer's manifestation had been less difficult, but at least the boy wouldn't be stuck in a faraway place with no family at all. He hoped this counted for something, because otherwise he was at a loss.

"Look! A petting zoo!" Josh pointed toward the pens with his fried dough, excitement apparent in his voice. While his partner preferred to avoid animals, Josh loved them. They were unable to communicate in ways that compounded guilt and anxiety, and they enjoyed physical affection and never asked questions about it.

"I see a goat. Better finish our snack before we see that one."

The goat did cause a twinge of guilt it reminded him of Gladya, and how dreadfully he had behaved towards Dr. Jones. It was unfortunate that the Welshman had left the United States; he had, after the initial poor start, actually been very nice.

Josh was very glad that Tomer was unaware of any of this.

"What animal should we see first? The sheep? The ducks? Ooh, is that a rabbit hutch?"

[Tomer Berelowitz]

Attending field day had nothing to do with Sean and everything to do with Vivy, who had threatened to move her stuff into Tomer's room if he did not bodily experience this evergreen phenomena all the Berelowitz children had read about and seen in TV and movies but had never been to themselves. Sure, sometimes schools hosted little fundraising fairs with the fishing game and the prize-under-a-cup game, but apparently a Ferris wheel and a petting zoo shoved everything into an entirely new category that Vivy had said she was going to experience vicariously through Tomer or else.

Sometimes he regretted teaching her that word, vicariously.

But Tomer was lying if he said he'd had no interest at all; he had his siblings' curiosity and it did sound like fun. He'd just have to be careful not to get jostled too much and be extra mindful of what his feet were doing. The prospect of being stared at was offset by a great many other things that were much more interesting (he hoped) to look at, and well, as horrible as it sounded, both his uncle and Sean were big enough to hide behind.

So far it had been very agreeable and Tomer had been enjoying himself (albeit in his own rather understated way). He hoped he wasn't slowing everyone down too much, but there was a lot to see and they weren't in any hurry. Using crutches (as opposed to a walker, which he had vehemently objected to) did not leave Tomer any hands free to carry things, but luckily before he'd left for Vermont Bee had provided a solution. Around his neck on a length of soft cord hung an 8'x5' pouch made of a blue tarp material Bee had gotten as a giveaway at a bank three years ago; over the 'Westlake Financial Group' logo was a montage of worn stickers that could only be identified as having started life as something girly by the pastel shades and heart shapes. Tomer didn't mind. It was holding his bundle of fried dough sticks.

"Look! A petting zoo!"

Animals were a subject Tomer was in complete agreement with his uncle. They were awesome. His face broke into a grin that mirrored Uncle Josh's in more ways than one, and he swung his crutches around. Goats milled about, and sheep, and Tomer thought he saw a glimpse of little baby pigs.

"I see a goat. Better finish our snack before we see that one."

"Will this work?" Tomer pushed his snack down into his pouch and zipped the top. The inside would smell like fried dough, but that was more than okay.

"What animal should we see first? The sheep? The ducks? Ooh, is that a rabbit hutch?"

"Bunnies," Tomer said firmly. He loved hearing about his uncle's various rabbits, and they were an animal he could probably pet while sitting down. He wasn't tired, not yet, but conserving energy wasn't a bad thing anymore. "And then the sheep."

They were all so cute it was getting hard not to make little 'awwwwwwwww' noises.

[Joshua Bernstein]

"Bunnies it is!" Josh agreed, changing course to approach the pens. Before they had even reached the gates he had begun rummaging through his pockets for the roll of tickets he had purchased at the entrance to the fair.

He yanked off two, handing them to the young man guarding the zoo.

They passed the sow and her piglets on the way to the rabbit hutch, but Josh didn't stop; they had made a plan, and he would stick with it. He did, however, deliberately keep to a slower pace than he would've otherwise used. His legs were longer than his nephew's, and he didn't want the boy to struggle to keep up. If Talia heard he had been insensitive to her son's disability he would never hear the end of it.

Speaking of Talia, the woman in charge of the rabbits looked to be about her age. She gave the two a smile of greeting as she opened the hutch, holding one of the bunnies (white and black and oh so tiny) to Tomer.

"Do you have pets at home?" She directed the question at Tomer as she lifted another bunny from the hutch for Josh.

[Tomer Berelowitz]

Following his uncle eagerly, Tomer smiled at the ticket man at the petting zoo gate and made extra careful sure that his crutches didn't knock into an animal. Or end up with toothmarks. The little piglets scampered around, as friendly as puppies, and further down, the goats and sheep stood placidly as they were petted. Large pans of water were near the ducklings, and some of them paddled about while others crowded their mothers. The rabbit hutch was large and airy, and in Tomer's opinion every bunny inside of it was cute.

Flicking his pouch around so that it hung down his back like a cape, Tomer took the little rabbit with big eyes and a breathless "thank you" and sat down on a nearby hay bale. He cradled the bunny carefully and let it sniff his hands and shirt. To the lady's question, he shook his head. "No. Our apartment doesn't allow any." Tomer used his eyes to indicate his uncle. "But he has a bunny."

Putting one hand under the bunny's feet while holding it with the other, Tomer gently lifted it up to his eyeline. The bunny had bright ink-drop eyes and a nose that never stopped moving. Its fur was so soft Tomer wished it was bigger so he could hug it. There was an irony there, that Tomer was finally in a place where he could have a pet but didn't have the mobility to properly care for one.

"Do you think Mopsy needs a friend?" he asked Uncle Josh, only half kidding. After all, both his uncle and Sean were away most of the day, and Tomer doubted Mopsy watched TV or listened to the radio.

[Joshua Bernstein]

There wasn't much room left on the hay bale Tomer was perched on, and even if there had been Josh didn't want to crowd his nephew. Instead he chose the neighboring bale of hay, cuppingj the bunny he had been given gingerly in both hands.

"Rabbit lovers, I see. Then I don't need to instruct you in how to approach them," the woman laughed, turning her attention to the man coming in behind them with no less than three children under the age of ten. Eager, but a but loud to interact with quiet and easily startled bunnies, and thus in need of supervision.

Josh caressed the Benny's velvety fur as he contemplated Tomer's question.

"Are you saying Sean and I aren't friends enough?"

That was probably an accurate assessment,,were he honest with himself. A demanding schedule was the reason he had opted for a rabbit over a dog to begin with, although at least now Mopsy had Bailey and, on occasion, Tomer.

"Sean and I have an agreement not to get any more pets once Mopsy passes, so I don't tbi k she'll be acquiring friends before then, either."

[Tomer Berelowitz]

The bunny was tiny and fit easily on Tomer's lap, and he used a gentle finger to scratch under the bunny's chin and around its ears. He winced as the dad with the three kids entered. The kids' voices grated on Tomer's ears even though they were all excited and happy. There was something about little kids' shrieking that had always gotten on his nerves, even when he'd been that little himself. So he concentrated on the very little bunny, on the warmth of its body and the softness of the fur and the little twitching nose. There was a little wire ball full of timothy hay on the bale beside him, and when he offered it he could feel the sharp teeth nipping off pieces.

"Are you saying Sean and I aren't friends enough?"

"No!" He hadn't meant to offend, and he blushed a little as the corners of his mouth tugged up in nervousness. Tomer looked down at his bunny and a more natural smile spread over his face. "I meant... you're gone a lot. But Mopsy has a lot to do, so that's good."

Tomer had made more than one gift for the rabbit in his time and often gave Uncle Josh a Hanukkah present for him.

"Sean and I have an agreement not to get any more pets once Mopsy passes, so I don't think she'll be acquiring friends before then, either."

That surprised him. Logic said it was only reasonable, his uncle and Sean were getting older and taking care of pets was a lot of work, but Uncle Josh owning a bunny was sort of... a constant. He'd had one bunny or another since before Tomer had been born, and Tomer figured he'd probably always have one. He tried to remember how old Mopsy was. Well, it meant he'd just have to make extra sure to enjoy her.

"One of us'll have to get one after Mopsy and then you can come visit," he said, meaning one of his siblings or cousins by 'one of us'. Tomer doubted it would be him. He couldn't touch his toes without falling over, so trying to pick up a bunny was out. But both Abby and Vivy had expressed interest (the same as he had) in a pet. Tomer guessed once his sisters had their own places (or dorm rooms, as it were), he'd have hermit crabs or kittens or whatever to hear about. It was something he looked forward to.

His bunny was inquisitive, and finally squirmed off Tomer's lap onto the hay bale. He turned as much as he could and kept the toy in his hand so the bunny wouldn't jump off the bale (right away, anyway). But the bunny was content to wiggle around, pulling hay out of the little ball, and finally lay on its side. Tomer smiled and petted it, and dug in his pocket for his phone.

"Smile," he whispered at the bunny, and took its picture. And then he held the phone up to his uncle and snapped one of him too.

[Joshua Bernstein]

"Does the school not allow pets?" Josh admittedly wasn't familiar with Hammel's policy regarding animals, but he thought he recalled Sean mentioning something about a student being given a pet snake, and his former intern had once discussed a friend's tarantula. Given that some students could turn into animals he assumed the school had the facilities to care for them, but humans taking on animal form wasn't the same as pure animals and there could be predators of the students' shifted forms so there were also reasons to disallow animals that weren't specifically for disability purposes.

However, Tomer could probably qualify for a special pet. He made a mental note to discuss Hammel policy with Sean, and the possibility of Tomer acquiring a pet with Talia.

"You could get a pet now, if they do, instead if waiting until Mopsy is gone."

He twitched his nose at the bunny in his hands, only belatedly realizing what his nephew was doing with the phone. He heard the snap, so reminiscent of a proper camera shutter, and attempted a posed smile far too late.

Whatever picture Tomer had managed to take was undoubtedly quite goofy.

"You should warn me before taking pictures! How can I be sure you got my good side?"

[Tomer Berelowitz]

"They do. Animals that can be in a cage," he said. "But if a bunny got onto the floor..." Well, he was going to have to finish that, wasn't he? Tomer didn't even say cuss words in the privacy of his own head, but thought, with feeling, puke. "There is limited mobility," he finally said, clipping off the last two words with a precision borne of distaste. And in case his uncle didn't get it, he added, "Unconductive to pet ownership."

The picture of Uncle Josh was not that goofy in the scheme of things; Tomer had seen other such photographs where his uncle had been caught unaware and this one wasn't too bad. Besides, it did look like his uncle, probably moreso than a posed smile would've.

"You should warn me before taking pictures! How can I be sure you got my good side?"

"I didn't know you were about to... like... speak its language or whatever." Also, Tomer was not going to ask which side of his uncle was the good one. On the one hand, Josh had managed to get the sibling-child with the working brain to mouth editor, and on the other, having, say, Vivy instead of Tomer would've been exactly what he deserved.

Holding out the phone, he left the photo on the screen. "You can delete it if it's too horrible. Or you can take one of me when I make a face."

Vivy would also have sent the pic to her mom before she handed it over, too.

[Joshua Bernstein]

Josh was at a loss as to how to respond to Tomer's pointed reminder of his disability. Should he acknowledge this? Say something sympathetic?

His preference to ignore the uncomfortable won out and he said nothing.

But Tomer was probably going to acquire a surprise pet in the future.

"I'll have you know I speak fluent bunny," Josh informed his nephew as he took the phone and surveyed the picture. It wasn't a terrible picture, especially considering some of the pictures he had accidentally sent to people in the past. He was sober in this one, which automatically made it on a level above a number of pictures.

"How do you print these? I need to memorialize my relationship with this bunny. Although..." He rubbed his chin, pretending to be deep in thought. "Mopsy might get jealous."

He handed the phone back with a smile as he changes the subject to what he thought would be an exciting topic. "So are you going on the camping trip this fall?"

[Tomer Berelowitz]

Tomer was just fine with his uncle not saying anything. Since becoming disabled (and meta) he'd realized that once people decided against sympathy and variations of 'make the best of it' when presented with basic facts of his life, most of the time words failed them. It was at this point he either got silence (which he preferred), or the really odd (or offensive or insensitive or otherwise awkward) comments. So, score one for home team.

"It helps to know a second language," Tomer replied, face straight, holding up the wire ball for the bunny to nose. Then he smiled, doubting his uncle would get the reference. Of all the Muppet movies, Tomer and Bee loved The Great Muppet Caper the best. When the other kids were going on about how it was only a flesh wound, they were always ready with a rejoinder of how they'd brought the paper towels.

"You send it to your computer and then print it," he said. If Tomer had known more about his uncle's life, the irony of the comment about Mopsy would've made him snort. But he didn't, so he said, "Why Uncle Josh. You cad."

It was an old-fashioned thing to say, but Tomer knew what it meant (his mom liked renting old musicals) and it made him laugh a little to think of Mopsy sticking her nose up with a 'hmph!' and ignoring him the next time they played.

"So are you going on the camping trip this fall?"

Tomer had such mixed feelings on that subject that he immediately looked around for Sean, on the pretext of thinking about his answer. He couldn't spot him in the crowd, which didn't mean the man couldn't hear his thoughts on the matter, but since he wasn't where Tomer could see him it meant he probably couldn't arrive in time to do anything about what Tomer was about to say. Sean's telepathy had never been something Tomer had thought much about, but since coming to Hammel he was more aware of it. Not wary or suspicious, because Tomer had known the man his entire life and he'd been nothing but kind, but aware. And if he were here he'd know that Tomer was about to lie, why it was a lie, and his kindness might make him try to do something about it.

"No," he said finally. "I don't want to." Tomer shrugged a little and took back his phone. "I'd probably just sit around reading and I can do that here." Then, because he was curious, "Have you ever gone camping?"