Page 54 of Give Me a Sign
“I’d hope so,” Ben says, chuckling. “How’d they————keep them in your ears?”
“I wore a little bonnet thing.” I demonstrate tying it. The headpiece kept my baby hands from yanking out the devices.
“That’s cute,” Oliver says.
“So did you two know each other before camp?” I ask them.
Ben shakes his head.
“But get this,” Oliver says. “Turns out we go the same————.”
“The same what?” I ask.
“University,” Oliver says, expanding the abbreviation he’d used. He nods toward Ben. “So, has Ben told you that he knows some BSL?”
“————so really just the alphabet,” Ben says, smiling at Oliver’s encouragement.
“Really?” I ask.
“Show us!” Simone chimes in.
Before Ben starts signing, out of the corner of my eye I notice Isaac leaning against the bar, gripping his glass tight. He tries to get my attention.
“Want to play a game?” Isaac tilts his head to the pool table, where Natasha and Jaden are getting set up.
I nod several times. “Just a minute!”
Ben is holding out both hands, demonstrating the British Sign Language alphabet. “A, B, C...”
“Weird, it uses two hands,” I say. “That’s different.”
I glance over to the pool table, ready to jump up and play as soon as we make it through the alphabet, but Isaac has already recruited another partner: Mackenzie.
Okay, fine. I’ll stay over here.
I nod and take another sip of my water. I’m definitely going to end up with a headache if I spend the whole night with no sign language or hearing aids, trying to lip-read foreign accents.
It’s quarter to midnight when we finally get ready to leave the bar. I’m exhausted from third-wheeling the Brits. There’s only so long you can have an enjoyable chat about American and British differences, especially because what they were saying started to make a lot less sense the drunker they got.
The bartender leans across the counter toward me as she collects my empty water glass. “I’ll be praying————.”
“What?” I’m confused. Does she know I’m about to drive that beast of a vehicle outside?
She speaks up. “I’ll be praying you all can get your hearing back.”
“Back?” I scrunch up my face. “I never had it,” I say bluntly.
She looks irritated by my reply, so I’m relieved when Ethan tosses me the keys. “Here you go!”
“Really?” I sign.
“You’re fine. It’s not far.”
But it already feels very illegal, since my Illinois driver’s licensetechnicallyhas a minor curfew of ten o’clock. Yet no one else appears fit to drive, so I have to do this.
To make matters worse, it starts raining as soon as we exit the door. Ethan swings open the back door of the van for everyone to crawl in.
I climb into the driver’s seat and try to psych myself up, gripping the steering wheel tight. “Wait, Ethan!” I turn around and flap my arms to get his attention. “I don’t have my glasses!”
