Saving Elijah

"These are all the angels," he said, pointing to the fish.
    "It's a very pretty picture, Elijah. Who were they before they were angels?"
    "That's Jimmy. Jimmy was in the hospital."
    "When you were there?"
    He nodded. "He likes it when his mother gives him apples and honey in the kitchen. When he comes home from school."
    "Oh, then Jimmy got well, just like you did?"
    Elijah shook his head.
    "Jimmy died," I said.
    Ellen Shoenfeld gazed at him, one eyebrow raised.
    "Do you need a ride?" I asked. "I could drop you."
    She shrugged. "My daughter is supposed to be here."
    I nodded, turned to go again.
    "I think you're making a mistake," she said. "Giving up the class, I mean."
    "I'm sorry you feel that way, Mrs. Shoenfeld. But I have to."
    She clasped her purse on her lap and looked away. A middle-aged woman pulled up in a Chevy Blazer then.
    "There's my daughter now." Ellen got to her feet and shuffled toward the car.
    The woman behind the wheel unlatched the passenger door and swung it out. I could see the resemblance to her mother in her face, in the bone structure, the narrowness of the chin.
    "This is Dinah Galligan, Anita," Mrs. Shoenfeld said. And to me, "This is my daughter, Anita Braverman. And this is Elijah."
    The woman gave me a little smile, and one for Elijah. "Nice to meet you."
    Mrs. Shoenfeld was still slowly making her way to the car.
    "Come on, Mom."
    Just as she put her hand out to the door handle, Elijah walked over to her and tugged at her sweater. She stopped. "What is it, Elijah?" He motioned for her to lean down to him, which she did, then he whispered something in her ear.
    She straightened herself up and stared at him, then fixed me with a glare I'll never forget. Appalled, awestruck, skeptical, and suspicious, all at once. Finally, she got into the car, which pulled away.
    "What did you say to her, Elijah?"
    "I told her this one's name. That's all." He pointed to another of the blue figures in his painting. "Gerte."
    "Gerte?"
    He nodded his head, just once.

    *    *    *

    When we got home, I tacked his picture up on the door where I always put his drawings, then sat down with him at the kitchen table with a pencil and a pad of paper. I thought if I could calmly be with him, I might be able to ask him how he knew the names he'd never heard of dead people he'd never met.
    We worked on his letters for about fifteen minutes. Hunched over the page, nose to paper, forehead scrunched up in concentration, Elijah was gripping the pencil the way he usually did, awkwardly, with the pencil resting in his palm, his fingers clenched around it in a fist. I kept trying to get him to hold the pencil the standard way but he kept going back to his way, until I finally curled my hand around his and made the letters with him. We were up to j, our previous attempts strewn all over the table's surface.
    "Elijah," I said. "Who's Charlie?"
    He smiled without looking at me, and moved his pencil, concentrating hard. "Somebody important to you, Mommy."
    To me? I'd never met my mother's brother. He was just a baby when he died, my mother was only a little girl. "How do you know this, Elijah?"
    He looked up. "There's a big sun shining in the water, and Charlie is there. Can I go watch TV now?"
    I sighed. "Go ahead."
    When Sam got home from work a few hours later, he noticed the painting taped on the door and asked Elijah about it. Elijah repeated the angels' names for his father.
    Sam stood for a moment looking at his son, then said, "Jimmy?"
    Standing by the stove, getting dinner ready, I held my breath.
    Elijah nodded. "He died in the hospital."
    Sam's expression was indescribable. "How do you know that, Elijah?"
    Elijah shrugged. "I don't know, Daddy. I just do." And he took his Creatures of the Deep book and Tuddy and left the room.
    "Go ahead, Sam," I said, folding my arms in front of me. "Explain that away."
    Sam frowned, but then he turned and stood gazing at the picture for a while. For a moment, just for a moment, I thought his infuriating rationality might be beginning to crumble. But then he said, "Do I have time for a swim before dinner?"
    Sam often did laps in our small pool after dinner on a warm summer night like this one. In fact, he'd decided that this was the summer Elijah would learn to love the water as much as his father did. He'd enlisted Alex and Kate in his campaign to persuade Elijah into the pool. "He loves to take baths," Sam said. "He loves those fish, for God's sake. He shouldn't have a