The handsome boy appears to be having a lively conversation with me as I wave a quick goodbye. This is usually the part when I pull out my phone and let them see my standby note I've shown at least fifty people since arriving two weeks ago-the one that more or less reads, I'm sorry-I'm deaf, and I can't hear whatever the hell you're saying. In reality, it starts with an apology and ends with an explanation of what it means to be deaf. People are generally stymied by the fact I can't hear because to them I look average in every other way. The thing about being deaf is no one really wants to believe you for the first few minutes. Some days I'd rather not believe it myself.
He pulls me back gently as I try to make my way past him, and the soft scent of his spiced cologne washes over me in a warm heated wave, orange and mint. His eyes squint out a smile all their own as his bowed lips expand for me with kindness. My stomach gives a hard pinch followed by a detonation of heat I've yet to feel before. Whoever this boy-man-man-boy is, he's got my full anatomical attention. Funny because that's never really happened before.
"What's your name?" His lips are full, the bottom more so than the top. They look softer than that of most men's, and, oddly, I'd like to lose myself staring at them all day.
The bodies have all but cleared off campus, a good sign that I'm already late to class. I shake my head and point to the English building before bolting out of his grasp. My heart pounds so fast it pulsates right through my skull. Adrenaline shoots through me as if I've just conducted a prison escape-more like a Grim Reaper escape. That truck could have killed me. Correction, it would have-should have.
I'm starting to think Kaya was right-life is different and scary. That boy's face comes back like a photograph I've unwittingly pinned to my mind, and my lips curve into a smile.
Despite Kaya's worldly cynicism, I still believe life is beautiful.
* * *
In Sociology I meet my interpreter, the one the university graciously furnished me with, an undergrad like myself. He's tall and lanky and wears an easy grin.
My name is Jean-Paul, but don't call me that. He winks as he signs. It's too French. I'm going by Tristan. John-Paul-Tristan-is a French foreign exchange student who knows American Sign Language (very well might I add). He goes on about how he's studying to become a professor at a school similar to Quincy in Provence, and how (according to himself) he ironically speaks impeccable English. His mother is profoundly deaf, like me, so he's been proficient in signing since he was a young boy. He works with the university's DSP department, Disabilities Services and Programs. Tristan is taking all four of my classes this semester.
I can sign three different languages. He seems stoically proud about this.
That's nice. I can only sign the one. My face heats when I smile.
I think we should coordinate our schedules as much as we can for the next four years. He signs while the professor takes roll.
Tristan has a calming spirit and boy next door likability to him, and already I want to be his friend. He also plays for the basketball team, which he's mentioned about a dozen times in the last five minutes. He's cute in a Muppet sort of way. He has clear blue eyes much like my own and a nice, although thin-lipped and exaggeratingly long smile-thus the Muppet reference.
My thoughts revert to the boy who snatched me from a waiting casket just a few minutes ago, and I envision what it would be like if he were my interpreter for the next four years. A pulsating heat shoots through my stomach. I think I'd have a cardiac episode before lunch. Pretty boys and I have never mixed well. Not that he was a pretty boy, more like a beautiful man. And judging by that tattoo creeping up the side of his neck, a little rugged around the edges.
Tristan gently taps my arm, and I come to.
Four years. I sign back. That's quite a commitment. I smile. Yes, I guess that would make it easy. I'm a Fine Arts major, though.
That's perfect. I plan on get my masters in English. You're welcome to tag along. He gives a little wink, and my chest rattles with a laugh.
Silent laughter is something I had to learn to perfect. Speaking isn't something I prefer to do. Most of my profoundly deaf friends have broken out of their lingual shells and speak freely, but, despite years of speech therapy, I haven't had the best experiences with my vocal cords, so I prefer to mute them whenever possible-which is pretty much always. When I was little I would ask my brothers to describe the sound things would make, the slam of a door, the babble of a brook, and soon they made a game of trying to describe any and every sound on the planet to me. Of course, the descriptions were rife with emotion because that's about as close as I could relate them. There was angry thunder, happy trees as the wind rustled through their branches, surprised doorbells, and the trash trucks that drove down our streets at early hours were always described as tired. Ironic since those were the very things that would wake my brothers an hour earlier than necessary on Thursdays, leaving my mother with a very tired Bryson and Holt. I, on the other hand, slept like a log. Still do. It's my only talent, really.
Class moves all too fast for me. Tristan decides to take copious notes before shooting them to my laptop immediately. Whenever the professor says something he deems witty, Tristan is kind enough to sign it for me.
By the end of the class, I'm taxed from both the novel experience and Tristan's incessant self-monologue. In one short hour I've become proficient in all things Tristan, his birth name being just the tip of the French iceberg. I now know he has three sisters, all of which are enrolled in fashion school. I know he's bred hamsters for the last three years as a part of his horticulture and animals club which sounds a lot like 4-H.
By the time our final class of the day rolls around, Digital Studios, I'm exhausted both emotionally and physically.
I think my brain actually hurts, I sign as we take seats near the front. It's a small class with only about twenty students, something far more my style compared to the stadium seating lecture halls we've endured. English 101 already has me cagey because I'm terrified of writing papers.
You're just overwhelmed. Tristan pats me on the knee, and instinctively I pull my legs in. Sorry.
No, it's fine. I'm just jumpy today. I sort of got off to a rocky start when I narrowly escaped my true destiny as road kill, but I leave that part out. That boy with the calming marble eyes comes back to me. I lean into my seat and sigh into the memory. His orange scented cologne still clings faintly to my sweater as I push my nose into my shoulder.
A tall girl wearing an expensive leather jacket and buttery boots that creep up her inky denim jeans saunters in. She's beautiful, like cover model perfection with bouncy blonde curls, patriotic red lips that glide over her paper-white smile. Instinctively my stomach turns. That's the kind of girl the boy with the marbled eyes would go for-the kind he most likely belongs with. Kaya once broke dating down into leagues, and, plain and simple, I'm not even on his playing field-but Ms. Red, White, and Blue Jeans is by a landslide. The girl next to her looks equally gorgeous with darker hair and eyes-the same I've-got-the-world-by-my-father's-Master Card smile. I've noticed girls like that travel in packs around campus. Back at Quincy there weren't really any social cliques or barriers besides the obvious, and when we were together we hardly noticed that one.
Ms. America One and Ms. America Two scoot into our row and both Tristan and I pull our legs in to accommodate them. One of them holds the scent of an overbearing perfume about as subtle as frankincense and myrrh. I make a face at Tristan, but he seems momentarily entranced by the volleyballs expanding from their sweaters. Figures. It's a man's world until a D cup shows up and debilitates the masses.
He doesn't hesitate starting up a conversation with the tall one.
"She's deaf." I see his lips form the words, and my face floods with heat. I am deaf, but I'm also allergic to labels. Kaya wears her hearing loss like a badge, but I'm not so eager to flaunt the stones God placed in my ears to the rest of the world.
The girls take their seats before he leans in and signs. They asked how we were enjoying our first day.
How very nice of them. I gesticulate a little to get my sarcastic edge across. Next time just tap me on the arm, and I'll know to pay better attention. It's not like I want to keep the fact I can't hear a secret, but I like to be a part of things. Sorry if I'm coming across snippy. I'm tired and hungry and all too ready to crash on that squeaky twin mattress back at the dorm.