By the time Toby’s sister found him, he was well deep in his meltdown.
He had tried to shut it down instead, he really had. He had felt it coming and had tried to push it back down. But his sister had left him feeling unmoored, and then the voice that she’d put in his head started mocking him, and it got to be too much.
Wait, you need more context. I’ll rewind.
Tomorrow’s Regret had been Toby’s favorite band for so long. There was something about the bassist’s work in particular, it felt like Toby’s heartbeat. So when he saw that they were coming to town, he begged his sister to take him.
“Are you sure?” she asked. “You’ve never been to a concert before. Do you think you can handle one?” Before the words were completely done echoing between them, she already regretted them.
Okay, I feel like you might need even more context. I’ll rewind again.
Toby and Tabitha’s parents died in a car crash shortly after her 15th birthday. Toby was 12 at the time. They were sent to live with their maternal grandparents, who weren’t really equipped to deal with Toby’s needs. Neither was Tabitha, but at least she’d had most of a lifetime learning strategies.
The move was a trauma, of course: It meant a new school district, one that was less capable of helping students with special needs. New friends, and while Tabitha had kept in touch with her old friends on social media, a different state, an inability to interact daily in person, meant things faded away. Especially with Tabitha having to help navigate Toby through a brand new system that he just didn’t seem to work well within.
As Toby entered his teen years, at least he settled down. He was bonded to Tabitha, of course. Clung to her in ways that sometimes helped her feel needed in an otherwise indifferent world and sometimes felt smothering. And as she entered adulthood, she made decisions on her education and career that left her still capable of supporting her brother: More of that feeling of being both needed and smothered.
That’s why she winced internally when she asked him if he could handle the concert. She’d learned that asking him that about new experiences planted the seeds of disappointment: It gave his brain permission to sabotage the event.
But she’d said it, and the best way was to just let it linger without trying to pull it back.
“Yes, I’m sure. It’s Tomorrow’s Regret!” He waved his arms wildly and started singing one of their songs.
Tabitha watched him and sighed. She’d been to concerts, and the place the band was playing was dark and claustrophobic. She worried about what would happen when that dark claustrophobia contrasted with the bright light show, and she knew the volume would be way too high.
And so she relented. “But you need to bring headphones. Over the ears, Loops won’t be enough.”
That elicited a scowl. “I don’t want the band to see that I’m different. Especially not Marcus.”
“If his bass really speaks your heartbeat,” she said, “he’ll understand why you need the headphones.”
And so he agreed, but on the day of the concert, he couldn’t find them and it was time to go.
Tabitha suspected that it had been deliberate, that he’d hid them somewhere that she wouldn’t be able to find them so he could prove to her that he could handle the experience like everyone else handles experiences.
Toby hated being the way he was. Everyone around him, including his sister, navigated through the world so easily, and everything he tried to do was so fraught. Too loud. Too bright. Too much judgment.
The judgment was one of the worst parts. Toby was so acutely aware of everyone staring at him, judging him, questioning him, wondering what was wrong with him.
But he was so excited about Tomorrow’s Regret, so against Tabitha’s better judgment, she let him leave the house with just his Loops.
During the opening act, they hung out in the lobby, which reeked of weed, mildew-laden concrete, and aging plywood. He bought a shirt, making sure it was a light enough color that Marcus could sign it. Tabitha split her attention between her brother and the opening act, trying to decide whether they were worth exploring more later on Spotify.
Her ultimate decision: Not really. They weren’t even in the same genre of Tomorrow’s Regret. They were some retro goth act, the woman at the microphone crooning out like a Souixsie-wannabe, while Tomorrow’s Regret had far more pop sensibilities layered over those lyrics that appealed so deeply to the teen angst she was currently surrounded by.
Nineteen now, she realized that she was one of the oldest people in the building who weren’t parents glumly chaperoning their teen children. Then she realized she was, really, a parent glumly chaperoning a teen child.
By the time Toby had gotten through two songs, Tabitha figured he’d be okay. She figured she’d worried for no particular reason, and she let herself slide into the music. Tomorrow’s Regret was decent enough, and she’d caught herself humming some of their hooks when Toby wasn’t around to catch her. She probably would have liked them more if he didn’t play them so much.
And the third track was her favorite, “Get Lost With Me.” It was one of Toby’s least favorite, so she didn’t have to hear it often, but even the first time she’d heard it, she’d really connected with it. So, true to the title, she got lost with the music, her attention drifting away from Toby. He’d been enjoying himself, and they’d found a fairly low-traffic area where he could flap and spin to his heart’s content.
Or so she’d thought.
But then, as the song faded and the crowd started to applaud, Tabitha was snapped back into reality by screams behind her, down an access hallway.
That’s where she found Toby, curled up on the floor, screaming, rocking, hitting his head against the cinderblock wall. There was a security guard standing over him, moving in the direction of picking him up. Several concertgoers were sticking their heads around doorways, watching her brother’s meltdown with bemusement.
“Sir,” she called out, trotting with urgency down the short hall, “I’ve got it. He’s my brother.”
The guard looked at her suspiciously, but stopped moving towards Toby. “What’s wrong with him?”
“It’s really okay,” she said. “He’s Autistic. He just needs me and some time to calm down.”
She could read the guard’s thoughts: “You brought an Autistic kid to a concert?” And yet he said nothing as he stepped back, and she crouched down in front of her brother, whose screams had reduced to whimpers, but who kept hitting the back of his head.
“Toby, sweetie, it’s me now. I’m sorry.”
She pushed down her sigh. This was so unfair to her, but this was also so unfair to him, too.
And so they were there together for what seemed like hours but, by Tabitha’s count, only lasted a few tracks from the band. She sat there silently, her hand on his knee, letting the meltdown subside. She didn’t try to talk him through it because she knew the only thing that would calm him down was time and empathy.
The rocking got less violent. The moaning slid into hums. Eventually, he opened his eyes and looked at her.
His eyes said he was sorry for being like this, so she said, “I know, it’s okay. What do you want to do now?”
Before he could answer, though, the opening riff for “Laughing At It All” came through from the main stage, and all the angst disappeared from his face. “That’s my song! Tabitha, they’re playing it!”
He jumped back to his feet, and though his cheeks were wet with the remnants of tears, there was unfettered joy in his eyes.
He spun then, just the two of them in this hallway, the darkness contrasted against the lights flashing from the doorway, where the guard had retreated, staring at this kid who had just switched from misery to joy as if a light switch had been flipped.
But Toby didn’t notice, or if he noticed, he didn’t care, his hands stiff and angled out like airplane wings as he spun around and around and sang out the lyrics at the top of his voice.
Tabitha stayed kneeling on the cold concrete, quietly watching her brother, tears coming to her own eyes.
But Toby didn’t notice, or if he noticed, he didn’t care.
Later, they’d get Marcus’s signature in black Sharpie on the t-shirt, while Tabitha, proud sister-mother, feeling hope that this had been a positive step towards his independence.