The autistic boy with the red hair

It is hard to pick one who touches me more than the others, they all do in their own way. But J has red hair and looks like my own Drummer boy, except he is half a head shorter with spectacular adolescent acne. He doesn't speak very much. I pick up the Indian tambourine and strike it rhythmically and his whole body starts to respond to the music while I sing. He dances while he is sitting on his chair, his hands drumming away, like Drummer boy does when he drives the family mad with his unconscious tapping.
He takes the tambourine when I offer it to him, holds it correctly and hits it in the two different quite complicated ways that I have shown him to get the characteristic Indian sound. I am astonished. His face breaks into a grin that becomes a laugh of pure pleasure, and his arms flap into the air.
His laugh rings in my ears for the rest of the day.