Jamie, With the Blue Eyes

By

Betty J. Sayles

            A small boy trudged wearily along a country road. His golden wheat-colored hair and youthful features looked no different than those of many other small boys his age. His jeans and Navy-blue pullover were dusty from the gravel road.  At first glance, he looked like any seven-year-old boy—until you looked into his eyes. Those deep blue eyes mirrored the sadness of his soul and spoke of wisdom far beyond his young years.

          The boy’s name was Jamie. He had been a fun-loving boy and he adored his father. They played catch, went to baseball games and went for walks when the father told his little boy about his plans for them when Jamie was older. “We’ll add your name to the firm and we’ll become Calder and Calder, Attorneys at Law. We’ll be the biggest firm in the state and the best,” he boasted. Jamie looked at his father with love in his eyes; he wanted, more than anything, to please his father.

          In his sixth year, Jamie was struck on the head by a car while he was trying to save a kitten in the car’s path. He recovered and seemed fine, but from that time Jamie noticed a change in his father. He was sure his father was avoiding him. One night, Jamie overheard his father talking to his mother. “Ever since the accident, he reads my mind, Jane, and he makes me do things by looking at me with those eyes. He actually made me let that stray dog go, the one that knocked over our garbage can. He said they’d kill him at the shelter. Mrs. Murphy told me he cured her back pain just by laying his hands on it and Dr. Preston said he talked to Jamie in Bridgeport last week. That’s 60 miles from here and Jamie was home in bed. That’s crazy. The boy is not normal.   

His wife replied quietly, “There was an Italian priest I read about, his name was Padre Pio. He could perform miracles and was seen in two places at the same time. They called it astral travel and the church made him a saint. Jamie is a good boy, Robert, he has only done things to help people.  He has been given a gift and we should be proud of it.”

          “He’s a freak, Jane, he’s scary, and I can’t cope with it. I’m going to find him a good home for troubled kids.”     

Jamie’s eyes filled with tears. His beloved father saw his gifts as a curse and couldn’t stand to be near him. Jamie didn’t wake up the next morning. The doctor said he was in a coma and he was moved to a hospital bed.  

It was evening when Jamie came to a farmhouse. When he knocked on the door, a sad faced man opened it. “Hello, sir, my name is Jamie and I wonder if you have any chores I can do for some supper.” 

“Why on earth is a small boy out alone with night so near,” wondered the man. As the question formed in his mind, he looked into a pair of deep blue eyes. “Yes,” he said, “you can feed the chickens, but first come meet my wife Mary and have some supper.”

          Jamie saw traces of tears on the woman’s face. After eating his supper, he said to the man, “There’s a man here who wants to talk to me.”

“There’s only my wife’s father who’s very ill. The doctor doesn’t think he’ll last the night,” said the farmer. Once again, he found himself peering into Jamie’s eyes. “I’ll take you to him,” he said.

          The bed-ridden old man was surprised to see a young boy, but as he looked into his eyes, he felt a calmness he hadn’t felt in a long time. “Leave us alone for a while, please,” he said to his son-in-law.

          Jamie sat in a chair near the bed, put his young hand over the old wrinkled one and said: “You feel alone and scared and want to talk.”

          The old man nodded. “You see, they’re afraid of death, too—for me and for themselves. They take good care of me, but they never stay to talk. They don’t know what to say, and don’t want to hear my fears. It makes them uncomfortable. You’re not afraid, are you?” he asked the boy.

          “No, I’m not afraid,” answered Jamie. “Tell me what you’re afraid of, maybe talking about it will help. I’ll stay with you as long as you need me.”

          The old man talked for a long time to the boy. As the night passed, he became quiet, only rousing to say, “You’ll be with me?”

          Jamie answered, “I’ll go with you as far as I can.”

 As the clock chimed 2:00 A.M., Jamie looked at the door.  It opened and the farmer and his wife entered the room. While they looked at the peaceful face of the old man, who had quietly passed away in his sleep, Jamie slipped out of the door and was gone.

          Jamie was nearing a farmhouse when two German Shepherds raced toward him, barking loudly. He stood still, his blue eyes looking at brown eyes. Immediately they stopped barking and followed docilely as he approached the farmer in the yard.

          “Good gosh, boy, what did you do to those dogs? They don’t like strangers.”

          “I get along well with animals, sir. Do have any chores I can do for something to eat?

          The farmer wanted to ask the boy who he was and where he came from, but he never got to those questions. Instead, as he looked into those deep blue eyes he had a vague feeling he had left something unsaid—but couldn’t remember what it was. “Why, I think we can find something for you to do to earn a meal, son. Come along.”

“Thank you, my name is Jamie”.

          After the boy had completed the light tasks he was given to do, the farmer took him into the house and told his wife Dorrie that Jamie was staying for supper. The woman had a kind face and fussed over Jamie in a motherly way. She did things slowly and with obvious pain, because her hands were badly deformed from rheumatism. Jamie offered to help her.  “No, child, a little exercise is good. It keeps these old hands from stiffening up completely”, she said.

          They invited Jamie to spend the night, but he thanked them and said he had to be on his way. As he was saying goodbye to the woman, he took both her crippled hands in his young ones and pressed them lightly. Then he stepped out into the twilight.

The woman sat at the table with her hands in front of her, tears running down her face. Her startled husband asked, “What is it, Dorrie, what’s wrong?”

His wife raised her hands for him to see. They were old hands with age spots and loose, wrinkled skin, but they were perfectly normal hands.

          A bearded young man sat on a park bench by the river, staring at the water. Then his eyes moved to the high bridge a few blocks away. He was annoyed when a small boy sat down beside him and said, “I’m Jamie. The water is warm this time of year. I guess it would be peaceful to sink beneath it, letting all your problems float away.”

          The young man was startled to hear such words from a child. It was uncanny the way he mentioned the river as a way to end one’s cares. He turned so he could see the boy’s face. Looking into those blue eyes, he saw his mother standing there broken-hearted beside the river, the terrified face of his young brother and a pretty, young woman struggling to cope with the problems he was leaving her to face alone. “Oh, Lord, what was I thinking? There has to be a better way than this.”

          Jamie said, “Tell me about it.”

          The young man talked for a long time.  Finally, exhausted and much calmer, he turned to face the boy, but he had quietly disappeared.

          Jamie was desperately tired; he wanted to go home. Maybe things would have changed while he was away. At the sound of his father’s voice, he opened his eyes. He was still in the hospital bed. His father was saying, “I’ve found a school for problem kids that will take the boy if he comes out of the coma. That will be best for everyone, Jane.”

          Jamie looked at the drawn faces of his father and helpless mother and closed his tear-filled eyes.

          A small boy trudged wearily along a dusty country road. He looked like any other seven-year-old, unless you looked into his sad blue eyes.