I do not harbour big fancy ideas about my brother’s marriage prospects. It is, however, quite nice to entertain fleeting thoughts of having nieces and nephews.
Jan is still such a baby. Perhaps, if there is time for it, we shall come back to such thoughts later on.
Chapter 2
The Policemen Were Blue,
The Doctors Were White
The 1st Step
After graduating from Balestier Special School at the age of twelve, Jan began to grow depressed. It was difficult to find a new place for his continued education and training. He missed school terribly, and after two or three years, he fell into a pit of melancholia. He refused to eat or drink or sleep, and would get constant fevers. Even medication did not help.
He had been asking to go for a holiday too. We had run into bad times so there was not money for that. I suppose Jan really wanted a breath of fresh air. He would listen, over and over, to the old songs my father used to play on our past family trips, and he grew increasingly miserable at home.
It was nearly impossible to make Jan understand why we could not grant his most fervent wishes; he got it into his head that we simply did not care to. He first began to give vent to his frustration and grief by throwing our things away.
The family noticed things going missing around the house. When we asked Jan about them – my parents and I had had a sneaky suspicion, because it was either him or little goblins – he made us understand that he had thrown some out with the rubbish, and dropped others down the bathroom drainholes. Jan also managed, twice, to smuggle the family house keys from drawers or bags, slip out the front door and cast them down the refuse chute.
The family tightened security around the house. With literally no other openings, Jan turned to the windows. That marked the beginning of the incidents with the police.
The family only confirmed that Jan was indeed throwing things out the window the second time he did so. We had not been sure the first time, when my father’s mobile phone disappeared all of a sudden. My mobile phone went missing next. We asked my brother about it and he confessed. I went down to the ground floor and saw the remains of my handphone lying where it had smashed onto the pavement.
The family got to work boarding up, sealing and installing double-grilles on all the windows, along with any other crevice that we thought Jan might manage to get a teaspoon through.
It was not enough. With his illness and unhappiness about staying idle at home, Jan grew weaker but angrier and more resourceful as well. He could not understand the changes that had happened around him, changes that he found disturbing. My brother went around pale and sickly, with a light in his eyes that was too bright.
The next year, Jan managed to pry open some window louvres near the kitchen ceiling which had had their metal frames rusted shut. Out went bottles of ketchup and some eggs.
Witnesses called the police. Father was at work. I remember my mother and I meeting the policemen at the front door.
My mother was upset and very much grieved. It did not help that a few of the officers did not seem aware that they were dealing with an autism family. I doubt some of them even knew what autism was. They were rude and aggressive.
I was not feeling particularly intelligent nor in a good mood that day, as I had a bad cold and had forced myself out of bed.
Still, I was determined that they were not going to touch Jan. I remember talking a whole lot. Most of it probably did not make much sense but I kept on talking anyway.
The officers began calling down senior officers who in turn called in their superior. The policemen were angry and we were angry. It took lots more talking to one or two superior officers who were sensible to reason before this was finally recognised for what it was – a special case. After long whispered debates and stern instructions from their superiors, the policemen began acting more kindly.
The police took down our statements, did a house check, and gave us reminders and warnings, and their consolations in turn. My mother and I cooperated with all the standard operating procedures. The matter was settled and no one laid a hand on Jan.
I lost my voice for a while after that.
Jan’s condition worsened till one day, he ran away from home. He simply dug out my parents’ house keys from their stash, opened the front door and took off while we were asleep.
When the family discovered what had happened, we began the Janhunt. My elder uncle’s family happened to be visiting from Malaysia – it was a Sunday – and they joined us.
My parents sought the help of the very same policemen who had handled my brother’s case previously. The officers sent out a mass alert to other posts and stations, then searched for Jan as for their own lost son. The station inspector leading the search climbed the stairs to all eleven storeys of our block in search of Jan. My hat will always come off to them.
We looked everywhere we thought my brother might be capable of getting to. The thing everyone had to remember was that, ill or not, my brother was still a very resourceful fugitive.
I found it difficult to stay put in the middle of the chaos, and to simply sit by and wait for news. I took off on my own, leaving my father, uncle and the police to rove the neighbourhood in their vehicles, and my mother to the care of my aunt.
Time seemed to pass by in a haze, as I was under the influence of a fever. I retraced the steps and pathways Jan and
