Haven

"You can't ask her that, Zayn. The responsibility may be too big.." I glanced through the window, seeing Zephaniah's parents discussing something inside their kitchen. I was seated outside on their garden bench, an ochre yellow cushion underneath me. Zephaniah slept on the bench that stood across mine, he hadn't gone to University today.

Apparently something had happened at night and he had to go to the hospital for it. I was confused, but Hannah had asked me to come over, so I did. Plucking my nails, I didn't really know what else to do. I stared at Zephaniah, his untamed hair was stuffed underneath a beanie, but the breeze would sometimes hit his fringe softly, the hairs gently stroking his forehead.

He seemed tired, even when he slept. I wondered what had happened. It wasn't a seizure, his mum had explained briefly at Uni. The bell rang before she could explain more- she needed to head back to the library. My mind hadn't been anywhere else but the news since then.

"Then who else is going to do it, Hannah?" His father sighed, his hands in his hair. "Tara isn't in his group, he said. William is aware of the situation but he isn't going to be around him all the time either. Haven sleeps in the same house, she would know."

Frowning lightly when I heard my name, I secretly glanced through the window, watching Hannah as she poured some hot water in a cup. "You can ask, but.. I can understand if she doesn't want to do it. It is kind of.. intimate."

Another deep sigh was heard, the exchange of soft kisses soon after that. She mumbled something to him, I couldn't really hear what. Perhaps, that wasn't my business, anyway. Even when I had heard my name.

"Haven, it's good to see you." His father smiled at me once he stepped outside, into their backyard, but the tiredness on his face said more about how he felt at the moment.

"Thanks for inviting me over! I was really worried when I didn't see him at Uni today. Tara didn't know anything about it either. Luckily I bumped into Hannah." Smiling at his mother, she warmly returned it, placing my cup of tea in front of me.

Thanking her, I dipped the tea bag into the cup and waited until it was the colour of my liking. The cup was still too warm to hold, so I left it on the table to cool off a little. "So, uhm, it wasn't a seizure?"

"No," his father shook his head, taking a sip of his coffee. "Gastrointestinal problems. A mouth full, that word." He chuckled, glancing at his wife who simply gave him a warm smile. "He had an extreme stomach ache last night. I don't think I've ever seen it that bad before. Apparently it had to do with his autism as well. Autism affects the mind, but the body too. Autistic kids have more issues with those than the other kids. Some report the doctor gave me explained it all." He shrugged, swallowing down more coffee.

"Gastrointestinal problems, the most known ones are constipation, diarrhea or gastroesophageal reflux. We didn't really know he's had that before. He had been constipated when he was little but I had simply sat him down on the toilet with a dog comic book. Never knew it could be something like that, you know?" Zayn glanced at me, his eyes resting on his son after that.

Hannah cleared her throat, nodding. "The doctor said it could be triggered by a lot of factors. The stress he may have, the way he experiences pain. Zeph is oversensitive at times, with certain things. The doctor thought he could've experienced it way more extreme than we would do, know what I mean? Not as in, excluding his pain, because pain is pain, but his brain might tell him it hurts that much.." Hannah gestured with her hands. ".. while for us it would hurt this much."

Zayn agreed with her, slowly nodding his head. He looked thoughtful, almost sad as he was still staring at Zephaniah, who was oblivious to the conversation as he slept.

"I'm sorry.." I said genuinely, looking at them both. "Is he stressing about Amsterdam?"

"Yeah," Zayn said, giving me a sad smile. "We figured that might be it, along with the bruises that had appeared on his stomach, so suddenly. Amsterdam's soon, yeah? And then the other things happening around him lately. He's.."

"He's not really used to being away from home." Hannah filled in, glancing at Zayn. "We never really went on vacation, except for our honey moon in Scotland. Poor thing had to leave Cooper behind at your mum's, do you remember?" Hannah laughed softly, looking at Zayn.

"He wouldn't stop crying for the whole ride. He was afraid Cooper would think that he would leave him behind and never come back. Because apparently dogs didn't have the ability to think about time, so leaving for a week would be something he wouldn't understand. Can you imagine how deep his mind went? That sensitive little man." Zayn shook his head, a smile visible on his face. "He didn't feel as safe without him."

"Was that a success?" I wondered, glancing at Zephaniah, and despite the fact that I had seen photo's before, still imagining what he would have looked like around that time.

"Was it?" Zayn chuckled, looking at Hannah.

"He had and still has trouble going places he doesn't know, just because he doesn't know what he can expect. It's something he doesn't have control of, and he finds that aspect hard. We had to take him to the toilet all the time- he didn't dare to walk all alone over the camping, had to help him with showering because once we would only leave and stand behind the door- he would get a panic attack already. He was eleven at that time." Hannah said, her eyes staring at the floor. "He couldn't really explain why, but I guess it was the autism."

"He peed his pants almost every day." His father groaned at the memory, but a smile played on his lips. "He still blurts it out, yeah? His mind is so busy with other stuff that he doesn't feel he has to go until he really needs to. That's why he will suddenly jump up and blurt out he has to go. Campings weren't ideal, we had to walk about five minutes to reach the sanitary building. It was too far for him."

I chuckled a little, my eyes squinting. That probably explained why he had said it out of nowhere at our house too.

"Goodness." Hannah laughed, I simply smiled, feeling warm at their words. They knew him best and their information only gave me better perspectives of him. "He's really sensitive. He had met someone on the camping, who had told him that his father had passed away. That night it stormed and when Zayn went out to check if the tent was still waterproof- he screamed and cried and tossed, afraid that Zayn would die. Few nights later he was still clung to him like a koala."

"Do you remember when they told him about SUDEP?" Zayn frowned lightly, suddenly looking at me. "Did you know Sudden Unexpected Death in Epilepsy exists? It's rare, but it does happen. Somebody had once asked Zeph if he was afraid of it. Well, he hadn't been, until that day. He had had several panic attacks that night just because he was afraid he would get a seizure in his sleep and die."

"That happens?" I swallowed, my eyes landing on Zephaniah. He was still far away in his sleep, bare feet hanging over the edge of the bench, one hand stuffed underneath the pillow, the other one resting beside his body.

"Yeah, sadly. But like I said, it's rare." His father gave me a small smile, resting his arm over Hannah's shoulders. "He'd been so affectionate, around that time."

"Hasn't he always been?" Hannah wondered.

I felt the need to mix myself into their conversation, curiosity getting ahead of me. "Really? He seems to not like it very much to be touched, in Uni and all.. I mean, he told me it hurts sometimes."

"It's the balance.." His dad hesitated, glancing at Hannah. "You see, he sometimes needs to be in certain situations to understand certain things. Even then, things could be unclear to him still. He's affectionate, sometimes too much, sometimes not at all. He might hug you and kiss you on the mouth, but not mean it in that way, yeah? He can be very touchy, but he doesn't mean anything with it other than being friendly, except when he mentions it himself, or looks this particular way. Example.. he saw me and Hannah kiss and he had asked why we did it. We told him we did it because we loved each other. Days later we saw him kissing his friend, Alexander's, mouth. Alexander hadn't really liked it that much, he was thirteen and starting puberty. Zephaniah didn't see what he did wrong, he loved his friend so he kissed him. Do you get what I'm saying?"

"I do, yeah. I do." I said honestly, thinking about his words for a while. Him playing with my hair probably didn't mean anything either, did it?

"He can be very touchy with the people he cares about, but hates it when people he doesn't know touch him. He finds it hard to balance that. It's either socially unacceptable as in, he is being way too affectionate, or the complete opposite like when it's his birthday, people want to kiss his cheek or shake his hand but he turns away because he's too sensitive at that moment or just doesn't want it." We watched Zephaniah as he slightly moved around in his sleep, his long fingers moving slowly. "It depends on his mood and stimulation level too, though."

Silently processing his words, I sipped my still warm tea, enjoying the soft taste of the strawberry. Taking a chocolate chip cookie off a plate his father had placed onto the table, my thoughts went back to when I visited Zephaniah last time. He had been so upset and I hadn't spoken much to him after that. I wondered if he was feeling better, I wondered how long Cooper would live still.

Cooper had been quiet the whole time, lying down near Zephaniah. It seemed like he slept too. He only looked up when a certain noise would come, that would cause Zephaniah to stir in his sleep.

"Can I ask you something?" I wondered, looking up at his parents, who had been in their own conversation for a while too.

"Sure, Haven." Hannah nodded, looking at me with questionable eyes.

"What if we're in Amsterdam and he gets a meltdown? In the middle of the city? At the guest house? I mean, what do you do when it happens? I've seen it at Uni two times or so now and I really want to help him but find it really hard to do so.. nothing seems to work at that very moment, after all. I don't want to harm him even more." I spilled, the unfamiliar feeling of insecurity creeping up.

Zephaniah's dad scratched his chin, he looked in thoughts for a while. "Well, when it happens at home, I softly grab his wrist and try to take him to his room to cool off. He'd told me once it was what he needs at that point. Usually he just wants to be alone to rage and become calm again. I suppose when it happens in the middle of the city, you should try to take him somewhere calm, a small street, for example. Make sure he doesn't hurt himself, uhm, perhaps it's better to stay with him in the city, but if it happens at the guest house I think it'd be best to leave him be in his room because he wants that."

"Don't touch him, except for his wrist if you need to take him somewhere safer or quieter. Don't ask too many questions, but for Zeph it is important to talk with him about it after that. You can ask what triggered it, whatsoever. Comforting him is important after that." Hannah added, Zayn nodding at her comment. "Do you know about shutdowns?"

"No? What is that?" I wondered, the term unknown to me.

"It has the same cause of when a meltdown appears, a person's response to reaching its crisis point, but it's just a different way of being out of control of the certain situations. You know a meltdown appears when he's experiencing too much stress, is overwhelmed, overstimulated.. and isn't able to cope with it anymore, yeah? Well, sometimes he gets a shutdown as well. A shutdown is basically that the person may partially or completely withdraw from the world around them. He won't respond to communication anymore, no longer able to move away from the situation he's in. Zeph just stares into the greatest unknown, for minutes long." His dad took a sip of his coffee, placing the now empty mug onto the table.

"When that happens, it's important to just leave him be as well, let him take his time to withdraw and recover. Uhm, Zeph, personally, finds it comforting if you stroke his cheeks after a while, so he can come back to reality. It's what we used to do when he was little and in one of his autistic stare moments as well. Other than that, he doesn't like a hand on his shoulder or if you keep whispering things into his ear. Just let him recover, stroke his cheeks for brief moments and it should be fine."

I was quiet for a while, another thing that was quite rare for me. My chattiness always got ahead of me, but this made me silent. How different were our worlds, now that I thought about it? Would I ever be able to fit into his? Even when I thought he already fitted well in mine? The mindsets were different, his way of expressing and coping with things were different, and it didn't matter to me- but did it matter to him?

"Thanks for this.. I didn't know a shutdown existed." I said quietly, glancing at Zephaniah.

"It goes unnoticed quite some times. A meltdown is an explicitly shown expression, of course." Hannah gave me a soft smile, handing me another cookie which I gladly accepted.

"What about a seizure?" I frowned, the thought suddenly popping up.

Zayn glanced at Hannah, he shifted in his seat. "Yeah, about that.."

Looking up at his father, I gave him a questionable look as he seemed to be hesitating about something. I wondered if it was about the conversation they had had in the kitchen when I had just gotten here. I had heard my name, and his dad seemed to be lost, his mum thinking it wasn't a good idea to ask me.

"When he has a seizure, it's important to make sure he can't hurt himself. Move the things away around him and put him in the recovery position so it can't get too suffocating for him. If he says he doesn't feel well and he tries to sleep on his stomach, you have to convince him to sleep on his back because it's dangerous to seize while sleeping on your stomach. He gets a bit reluctant, though. He says he can't breathe when he sleeps on his stomach, I'm not sure why.."

"A way of experiencing things differently, maybe? To me it feels as if I can't breathe when I sleep on my stomach." Hannah shrugged, "and no, not because I'm pregnant." She chuckled, poking her husband's nose who already grinned at her.

"Yeah, perhaps. Anyway, if he sleeps on his stomach, which he does every night, and he gets a seizure out of nowhere, you must roll him onto his back or side, put him in the recovery position. It is necessary to time his seizures. The seizure cannot take longer than five minutes, if so, medication should be given. And that's the thing.. uhm, we need someone to give him the medication if he seizes longer than five minutes. The doctor taught us how to do it and we have used it quite a few times when he's had severe seizures, and it's not too hard-"

"I'll do it. For sure, if it isn't too hard. Really." I offered right away, feeling slightly confused as he still seemed to be hesitating, Hannah just staring at Zephaniah.

"Yeah, but it's.. rectally. We had informed William, but he doesn't sleep in the same house. Tara doesn't want to do it because well.. and the host families are still unknown, so we can't ask them to do it." Zayn sighed, glancing at Hannah. "I wanted to ask you but Hannah isn't really thrilled about the idea."

"Nothing personal, Haven. It's just more for you. It is pretty intimate, and I don't know how you think about that stuff. It's quite a big responsibility. We just need you to be honest." She elaborated slowly, both of their eyes stood hopeful, how could I say no?

Besides that, yes, it was intimate, but I didn't think that would be my biggest concern once I would see him seize in front of me, a high risk of brain damaging present if it wouldn't be treated. "I'll do it."

"Are you sure? It's okay, really. We'll find another solution. You could call an ambulance-"

"It could be too late, Hannah." His dad frowned, but got shushed by Hannah as she shook her head, a warning expression on her face.

"She shouldn't cross her borders because of us, Zayn."

"Sorry." Zayn sighed, blinking his eyes. "I'm stressed, not even going to deny that. I've been overprotective, maybe. Perhaps, I'm finding this harder to let go than Zeph himself." He chuckled, but his smile faded right after.

Hannah softly grabbed his hand, kissing his cheek. "It's understandable. You have been through too much with him, but it will be okay."

"It will be. I'll promise to keep my eye on him, help him with his meltdowns and support him through his seizures. And I won't cross my borders with that." Gulping my tea down, I smiled at the both of them, the gratefulness visible in their eyes now.

"You're an angel, Haven." Hannah sighed. "Can we get in contact with your parents? Just to inform them and all, make sure they find it okay as well."

"For sure!" I smiled, searching their numbers on my phone and giving them to Hannah, while Zayn sat down beside me with the instructions. He had told me to keep them with me, the medication and more instructions were always present in Zephaniah's backpack. Apparently, had always been, in University too.

Drinking some soda Hannah had given me, I saw Zephaniah waking up. He rolled onto his back and slowly stretched out his arms, yawning quietly. Cooper stood up right after, barking once or twice and licking Zephaniah's nose.

He groaned lightly, but did smile at his dog, sitting up after that. "What up, Coop." He mumbled, looking surprised when he saw his parents, however, it turned to confusion when he glanced at me. "Haven?" He said after a long moment of silence, probably because he needed to process that I was here so suddenly, especially after he had just woken up.

"Hey, Zeph." I gave him a smile, realising he never really greeted, but said my name instead.

"She wondered where you were today, so I invited her." Hannah shrugged, lightly pinching his cheek. He squinted his eyes at that, it seemed like he couldn't quite understand still.

"I'm going to, uhm, drink chocolate milk." Zephaniah said unsurely, stepping inside their house with Cooper following him close.

Zephaniah's parents smiled at him and returned their attention back to me. "It's time to let go." His father sighed, rubbing his face gently.

"I'll look after him." I said.

And I meant it.

~~~

Now you know.. if you didn't quite understand - basically Zeph had gastrointestinal problems, along with loads of stress with everything that has been going on around him. Luke hitting him- the baby, Cooper with cancer, the trip to Amsterdam..

What do you think of Zayn and Hannah? As parents?

Haven taking the big responsibility?

Let me know your thoughts !! Votes comments and feedback much appreciated ❤️ 85+ votes..??

Medical Conditions Associated with Autism;
A range of physical and mental-health conditions frequently accompany autism.

Autism and gastrointestinal (GI) disorders;
GI disorders are nearly eight times more common among children with autism than other children.