Autastic

by Jeff Baker

The manager sat down across the table from Jake, his name tag said "Tony" on it and his shirt was disheveled from a day of hard work and dealing with customers. Eye contact is important in these situations, or so Jake had come to understand, but he had never been able to nail down how to do it. It always seemed like he either looked away too quickly, or over compensated and stared deeply into the other persons eyes until they got uncomfortable and looked away. But he knew it was important, and so he tried it. Jake looked at Tony's face, trying to find his eyes but instead of a well constructed face like you'd expect to see on another person Jake saw a shamble of features sort of floating over top of what should have been the face. Jake could see the eyes, but they were separate and wandering around, and he wasn't sure which one to look at. On top of that he was having trouble not being distracted by the nose and moustache which seemed to be drifting into the area where the eyes should be. This happened to Jake when he was tired, he had trouble seeing faces. He tried to get a good nights sleep the night before but got thinking about the logistics of shipping something in an inter-galactic society. He wondered about how the waybills would work and whether space amazon would still be able to do one day delivery when time dilation was an issue, and before he knew it the clock showed three in the morning, and he had to be up at 6:30 to catch the bus on time for his first of several interviews that day. None of the other interviews had gone particularly well as Jake was tired and kind of awkward under pressure. He was a hard worker and got the job done, and under the right circumstances was actually very charismatic, but again, he was tired, and it's hard to hide your autism when you're tired, and it's hard to get a job when you're autistic.

"What is your biggest weakness?" Tony asked him, scratching his temple with his pen. Jake thought about telling him about his autism, but he wasn't sure he wanted to. Not that autism was a weakness necessarily, but it did present some challenges. In Jake's mind it could go either way, some companies want to hire people with neurodiversity because it counts towards having diversity in the workplace, but some people still see autism as being nothing but meltdowns and arm flapping, and once that word is uttered it's not easy to get it back in the bag. Plus, Jake wasn't diagnosed with autism until he was already in his thirties, so he'd gone most of his life not knowing about it and dealing with the challenges on his own, so he wasn't sure it needed to be mentioned.

"My weakness..." he paused. "I would have to say that I can get fixated on certain things and then it's hard for me to concentrate on anything else." He said, and then continued after a pause, "...because of my autism..."

"Autism?" Tony sounded surprised. "You don't look like you're an autistic. Oh well, everyone has autism nowadays. I mean, everyone feels awkward, or angry, or shy sometimes. If I went to the doctor on a bad day I would have autism too!" Jake cringed. This was a common sentiment. Jake wished it was that simple, that this was something that would go away after some time to cool off or once he felt comfortable in a room. But it wasn't. This was Jake, like it or not.

"Look," said Tony, "This is a sales position-" "If you look at my resume, you'll see I have lots of sales experience. I even have some commendations for being the best upseller in the quarter." Jake blurted out. "Yeah, but your last sales job was several years ago." said Tony reluctantly, "What have you been doing since then?" "I was going to school and raising my kids." Jake said as confidently as he could, already knowing where this was going. "Look," Tony said again, "You're gonna have to be dealing with people all day and be able to read them really well to know when to go in for the kill, you know? I just don't think this would be a good fit. But I'll keep your resume on file. If something in the stock room opens up I'll give you a call, okay?" Jake's heart sunk. There was a knot in his stomach, but he swallowed hard and stood up. "Okay. Thanks for taking the time to see me." He said and shook Tony's hand. "Is there a bathroom I can use before I go?" "Sure." said Tony, "I'll get you the key." Jake followed Tony to the cash desk where he handed him a key on a lanyard attached to a ruler to make it easier to find and harder for people to walk out with. Jake grabbed it and quickly walked to the bathroom. He walked in, closed the door, and then sat on the toilet with his pants still on. He didn't have to go, he had to tick, and he was too embarrassed to do it in front of Tony. Jake contorted his face into a weird grimace by stretching back his face muscles and showing his teeth. He raised and lowered his eyebrows over and over in sets of five, and he clenched his fists hard, then flexed his fingers out as far as they would go, and then shook them off. He repeated this five times as well. Then he stood up, scrunched his face up, and then put it back to "normal". He walked out of the bathroom, handed the key back to Tony and smiled.

"Thanks." he said and walked out. The bus ride home was long and awkward. Jake was a little claustrophobic and with the amount of people crammed into the bus at rush hour he had a lot of bodies pressing up against him, which tended to overwhelm him; but he had his noise canceling headphones on, and he was listening to an array of podcasts that kept his attention focused on getting home in one piece.

When he opened the door to his apartment he immediately heard three excited voices call out, "Daddy!" He walked up to his kids.

"Hey buddies, can I have a hug?" he asked. "No, thank you." Said his oldest, "I don't like to be touched." "Sounds good." Jake said. His kids also had autism. Two of them didn't like to be touched, even by their parents, but the third one was very cuddly, so he climbed right into Jake's arms.

"How did it go?" Asked his wife as she walked into the room. "Not great." he said. "No one wants to hire a guy with autism. I just don't know what value I have anymore." He was feeling discouraged. "Hey." She said, grabbing his chin with her thumb and forefingers. "Look over there." She pointed to the couch where two of the three kids sat. "This world is hard for people like them. But they have something that gives them an advantage: a dad who understands them and would do anything for them. Not everyone can say that. Even as much as I love them, I'll never understand what it's like." Jake started to tear up a bit but held it in. He didn't need to do that, of course, crying is completely acceptable, but it's just how he operated.

"And even if you didn't have them, your value wouldn't change." She continued, "Your value has nothing to do with what you can do, but who you are, and you are kind, funny, and caring. Babe, you're not autistic. You're autastic!" Jake laughed at the bad joke, but she kept going, "Not to mention that you are talented and a hard worker, and I'm sorry that people aren't able to see that because they don't give you the chance to prove yourself." Jake kissed her, then put down his son and walked to the kitchen to make dinner for his kids. He had to make a different meal for each kid, because they each had their own taste sensitivities. He thought about them as he prepared their food, and all the things he wanted for them. Jake wanted them to have jobs and spouses, and a good life, but he knew firsthand how difficult life could be for someone on the spectrum. He thought about how he went over thirty years without a diagnosis and how good he was at blending in, but how he was still struggling now, and he felt a deep sadness for how his children would struggle as they grew. When dinner was ready they sat down together as a family, something that didn't happen often given everyone's hectic schedules. I'd like to tell you that it was a perfect meal, in truth, it was a very distracted meal where they had to nag the children to stay seated while they were eating, and listen to endless talk of dinosaurs and robots and whatever else the kids were fixated on. It wasn't what most people would call perfect, but it was full of love, laughter and conversation. It was autastic.