A special friend for a special night out

This was the year Monica Merritt turned 21, so this was to be her last year in the Abbey Lane elementary school in Levittown. Monica is a Down syndrome child, the victim of a mysterious combination of genetic short circuits that renders her slower, in some ways than other kids, and possessed of physical characteristics that make fellow victims of Down syndrome look as if they could be her blood relatives. Traditionally, their slowness and their common facial expressions - often accompanied by a characteristic speech impediment - have made Down syndrome children (formally known, somewhat gruesomely, as mongoloids) socially unacceptable to so-called normal people, particularly other children. But that seems to be changing.

Two nights after their bona fide, cap-and-gown graduation ceremony, the Abbey Lane "seniors" are treated to a bona fide prom. They are generally driven to the dance by their parents about 7:30 or 8 p.m. The parents return at 10 p.m. for an hour of coffee and cake and chit chat; and the whole affair breaks up at 11 p.m.

Because of the special way Monica was treated over the years by her sister and brothers and her neighbors - which was not really a special way at all - Monica has always considered herself a slow, shy perfectly normal sort of person. She had heard plenty about proms, and she knew exactly what she would need to enjoy her prom: a date. Her older sister, Mary Ellen, had been escorted to her prom by a date, and her brothers all had dates for their proms, too, so, Monica set out to get herself a date for the prom.

The first boy she approached didn't know what to say when Monica asked him to escort her to the prom. He was tactful enough to thank her for asking and to say that he was honored that she would; but he said he was busy that night. A day later, he made a special visit to Monica's mother, Virginia Merritt, and confessed very frankly that he turned Monica down because he was scared. He didn't know what he was scared of, but he was too scared to take a "special child" to a prom. Mrs. Merritt said she understood. She said that it took guts to admit that he was frightened.

Monica waited two months before she asked anyone else, but she aimed higher the second time around. Bobby Hubek, a graduating senior and a team-saving football hero at Levittown High School, lived across the street on Slate Lane, where he and other kids let Monica join in ball games once in a while, years ago. Bobby hadn't tossed a ball to Monica in a long time, but she had followed his career in the Sports section of the newspaper, whenever her father, George, read aloud to her about Bobby.

Virgina Merritt tried to alert Bobby Hubek before Monica closed in on him one day recently, but there wasn't time. Monica marched across the street and asked him directly. "Bobby had a torn football jersey on at the time," Mrs. Merritt said, "and he was fidgeting with one of the holes in it. You could see he didn't know exactly what to say. He said, Uh, uh, yeah, Monica, uh sure . . . like that, very nervously. But then he came over to see me the next day, and . . . well, you have to know that Bobby has the reputation of being sort of a rough and tumble. On the field and off. Especially in school, if you know what I mean. He's big and good-looking and tough, and sometimes he may have given the school people a time, you know? But he was always a gentleman with me. And he came over and said, 'Mrs. Merritt, I really want to take Monica to her prom. I really do. And I will.' "

"Well," Mrs. Merritt continued, "on the night of the prom, he walked across the street wearing his best suit and carrying a corsage, which he put on Monica's wrist. His father had just bought a light blue Chevette, and he asked me if it was all right if he took her in the car, because he had borrowed it for the evening. And when he took her out to the car, he opened the door for her, just like an old-fashioned boy. I can't tell you how beautiful it was. I just can't tell you."