Prodigal Son

beacon of hope.
        The story concerns a local organization raising research funds to find a cure for autism.
        By the strictest definition of the affliction, Randal Six might not have autism. But he suffers from something very much like that sad condition.
        Because Father has strongly encouraged him to better understand himself as a first step toward a cure, Randal reads books on the subject. They don't give him the peace he finds in crossword puzzles.
        During the first month of his life, when it wasn't yet clear what might be wrong with him, when he had still been able to tolerate newspapers, he read about the local charity for autism research and at once recognized himself in descriptions of the condition. He then realized that he was not alone.
        More important, he has seen a photo of another like himself: a boy of twelve, photographed with his sister, a New Orleans police officer.
        In the photo, the boy isn't looking at the camera but to one side of it. Randal Six recognizes the evasion.
        Incredibly, however, the boy is smiling. He looks happy.
        Randal Six has never been happy, not in the four months since he has come out of the creation tank as an eighteen-year-old. Not once. Not for a moment. Occasionally he feels sort of safe… but never happy.
        Sometimes he sits and stares at the newspaper clipping for hours.
        The boy in the photo is Arnie O'Connor. He smiles.
        Maybe Arnie is not happy all the time, but he must be happy sometimes.
        Arnie has knowledge that Randal needs. Arnie has a secret to happiness. Randal needs it so bad he lies awake at night desperately trying to think of some way to get it.
        Arnie is in this city, so near. Yet for all practical purposes, he is beyond reach.
        In his four months of life, Randal Six has never been outside the walls of Mercy. Just being taken to another floor in this very building for treatment is traumatic.
        Another neighborhood of New Orleans is as unaccessible to him as a crater on the moon. Arnie lives with his secret, untouchable.
        If only Randal can get to the boy, he will learn the secret of happiness. Perhaps Arnie will not want to share it. That won't matter. Randal will get it from him. Randal will get it.
        Unlike the vast majority of autistics, Randal Six is capable of extreme violence. His inner rage is almost equal to his fear of the disordered world.
        He has hidden this capacity for violence from everyone, even from Father, for he fears that if it is known, something bad will happen to him. He has seen in Father a certain… coldness.
        He puts the newspaper photo in the drawer once more, under the magazines. In his mind's eye, he stills sees Arnie, smiling Arnie.
        Arnie is out there on the moon in New Orleans, and Randal Six is drawn to him like the sea to lunar tides.

CHAPTER 13
        
        IN THE SMALL dimly lighted projection booth, a sprung sofa slumped against one wall, and stacks of paperbacks stood on every flat surface. Evidently Jelly liked to read while the movie ran.
        Pointing to a door different from the one by which they had entered, the fat man said, "My apartment's through there. Ben left a special box for you."
        While Jelly went to fetch the box, Deucalion was drawn to the old projector, no doubt original to the building. This monstrous piece of machinery featured enormous supply and take-up reels. The 35mm film had to be threaded through a labyrinth of sprockets and guides, into the gap between the high-intensity bulb and the lens.
        He studied the adjustment knobs and worked forward until he could peer into the cyclopean eye of the projector. He removed a cover plate to examine the internal gears, wheels, and motors.
        Across the balcony, the mezzanine, and the lower seats, this device could cast a bright illusion of life upon the big screen.
        Deucalion's own life, in its first decade, had often seemed like a dark illusion. With time, however, life had become too real, requiring him to retreat into carnivals, into monasteries.
        Returning with an old shoebox full of papers, Jelly halted when he saw Deucalion tinkering with the projector. "Makes me nervous, you messing with that. It's an antique. Hard to get parts or a repairman. That thing is the life's blood of this place."
        "It's hemorrhaging." Deucalion replaced the cover to