Puzzle

Excerpt from my book: A Time To Be Born

The phone buzzed in my pocket as I knelt beside Sally’s recliner, scribbling notes from her prenatal checkup. I was halfway through jotting down her fundal height when I saw the screen light up: Hadassah.

She’d been watching the kids for me ever since my last sitter got married. Steady, sweet. Never one to call unless it mattered.

“Hello?”

But I didn’t even get the whole word out before her voice rushed in.

“Amanda! I can’t find Kippy! I’ve been looking for 45 minutes. We all have.” Kippy was my autistic son Christopher’s nickname. Parents of autistic children know that wandering is a common and terrifying difficulty with autism.

My breath caught. “Oh, my. Where did you last see him?”

“I thought he was napping. His window was wide open. I—I’m so sorry. This is my fault.”

“No, it’s not,” I said quickly, already standing, already packing up. “I’m coming home.”

I ended the call. Hannah, who’d been checking Sally’s blood pressure, pulled out one stethoscope earbud.

“Everything okay?” she asked, her blue eyes widening.

“No,” I said, grabbing my prenatal bag. “Kippy’s missing. Again.” This was not Christopher’s first disappearance. We had tried everything: locking windows, coded doors, GPS arm bracelets. But he was a little Houdini.

She didn’t ask any more questions. She didn’t have to. Hannah had walked Christopher’s difficult road with me before, had prayed with us, cried with us, helped us search. She just nodded and stood. 

“You go,” she said firmly. “I’ve got things here. Right, Sally?”

“Of course,” Sally said. “We’ll pray. God will help you find him.”

I paused halfway through packing, then realized Hannah would need the whole kit.

“Don’t worry about it,” she said. “I’ll bring it by when we’re done. Do you want me to stop by the other three checkups, too?”

“Yes. Jenna, Carrie, and Monica . . . .”

She nodded. “Done.”

The front door banged behind me as I sprinted to our Suburban, the midsummer heat hitting like a furnace. I turned onto Fort Graham Road and pressed the gas, every nerve taut.

It was only a nine-minute drive, but it felt like ninety.

I prayed the whole way—loud, urgent prayers—and then called Dan, putting him on speaker.

“Honey,” I said, trying to keep my voice steady, “Kippy’s missing again. Can you call people? Get help?”

“Yes,” he said immediately. “I’m heading home now.”

Dan was at work in the church publications office, but he wouldn’t linger long, not for this.

I pulled hard into the curve of our driveway, skidding my tires. I left the Suburban running, then, remembering, turned back to cut the engine.

Helen was crying.

Hadassah stood on the porch, wringing her hands.

“I’m so sorry,” she said, voice cracking. Her blue eyes brimmed behind her glasses.

“You didn’t do this, Hadassah,” I said quietly. “We just need to start looking. Where have you searched?”

“We climbed the ridge behind your house and got as deep into the woods as we could. It’s thick up there. We also checked the river road, and we ran up to your parents’ house.”

The humid air was sticky and thick. I was grateful it wasn’t winter, but ninety degrees in the woods without water was dangerous, too.

“Do you know what he was wearing?”

Helen nodded, wiping her face. “Just his blue and red T-shirt. And a diaper. That’s it.”

My heart sank. Kippy was four now, sharp as a tack, clever with locks and levers, but he had no sense of danger. He was a little escape artist, slipping past every safeguard we could install. 

We’d found him before. In the rain. In the cold. Barefoot. Wandering under the stars.

Grabbing a water bottle, I started toward the ridge behind our house, ducking through brush and pushing past weeds that reached my chest. Endless varieties of Texas thorns scratched my arms, and insects buzzed hot around my ears.

“KIPPY!” I called. “Kippy, baby!”

But I knew he wouldn’t answer. He never did. Still, I called. And I called on God.

The ridge sloped steeply, and I caught the scent of dry cedar and wild onions. Then, beside an old red oak tree, something caught my eye.

A sock. Small. Striped.

And beside it was a little blue train engine. One of his favorites.

“I found something!” I shouted, holding them up.

Dan came crashing through the brush behind me. “What is it?”

“His sock. And his train.”

Just then, Blair’s dog Jet, a big black Lab, bounded up the trail, tail wagging, tongue swinging, full of sloppy joy.

“Maybe Jet can find him,” Blair said.

I knelt and held the sock and train out for Jet to sniff. “Find Kippy, boy. Go find him!”

Jet’s ears perked. He sniffed, gave a snort, then bolted up the trail, crashing through the brush like a tank. We followed as fast as we could. Blair clipped on his leash to keep him from disappearing.

Jet stopped suddenly at the edge of a steep bluff, pacing, whining.

“Oh, no,” I whispered, chest tightening. “Do you think he fell?”

Dan didn’t answer. He scanned the edge, then motioned to a steep trail off to the side, a scar of dirt winding down.

We scrambled down, slipping and skidding, grabbing roots for balance. I half-slid on my rear. Jet was already ahead, yanking at the leash, pulling Blair through nettles and rocks into a shaded creek bed below.

The air changed in the hollow, cooler beneath the limbs, and our footsteps echoed along the dry stones.

Then, around the bend, Blair’s voice rang out.

“Here he is! Here he is!”

We ran.

There, beneath a spread of pecan limbs, stood Kippy.

Barefoot. Dirt-streaked. Diaper sagging. His blue and red T-shirt was damp with sweat.

He was staring up into the treetops, completely unbothered. The filtered light turned his straight locks to flax.

I stopped and doubled over to catch my breath, and my heart. Then Dan and I both reached for him.

“Kippy,” I breathed, scooping him into my arms.

“Where did you go, baby?” Dan asked softly.

He didn’t answer. Just reached for his train engine and began spinning its wheels, calm as ever.

I wiped the sweat and grit from my eyes. “You can’t run off like that,” I whispered. “You scared us.”

We made our way home, branches slapping our arms, hearts still pounding.

I pulled out my phone—twelve texts from Hannah and the mommies I had been supposed to see.

The mommies at all the checkups are praying. Did you find him? Is he okay?

I typed back:

We found him. He’s okay. Or the dog found him. He’s safe.

It was two days later, during lunch, when my brother Asi called.

“Amanda,” he said, “have y’all ever thought about getting a service dog for Kippy?”

“Definitely,” I said. “But it’s completely out of our range. They’re ten to twenty thousand dollars.”

“Whoa,” he said. “I didn’t know they were that expensive.”

“Yeah. And it’s a process, being matched with the right dog, months of training. It’s not just something you pick up.”

“I was just wondering,” he said.

I didn’t think much of it.

And then, one afternoon weeks later, Asi pulled into my driveway.

“The community pitched in,” he said. “They’ve raised fifteen thousand dollars for Kippy. To get him a dog. We’re opening an account just for his needs.”

I couldn’t speak for a moment. How had this happened?

Then I started remembering little things I hadn’t really noticed as unusual. Little kids with lemonade stands, shouting, “Lemonade for a dollar!” Teenagers sweating through hay hauls for neighbors. Cookies for sale after choir practice.

Nine months later, we stood outside the Dallas airport, scanning the crowd.

Two trainers stepped through the doors with a tall, apricot-colored standard poodle at their side, calm, poised, beautiful. He’d been trained in search and rescue. Trained to calm meltdowns. Trained to stand between a child and danger.

Kippy didn’t even see the people.

He ran straight for the dog.

He threw his arms around its neck and buried his face in its fur. It was love at first sight.

We named him Puzzle; he was a missing piece in Christopher’s puzzled world.

From that day on, Kippy never climbed out another window or scaled another fence. Puzzle was always there, watchful, steady, ready to alert us if he even thought about it.

And the scattered pieces of our days slowly started to fit back together.̰