The Silence Between Us: Chapter 27–Epilogue

I felt marginally creepy tiptoeing my way upstairs, but the desire to locate Beau and make sure he was okay won out.

Two pristine bookcases that looked as if they'd come right out of a university library took up most of the space in the room.

Books were strewn all over the bed, this time mostly school texts instead of novels.

He raised an eyebrow, a rather wry smile pulling at his lips.

It was strange to see him looking so crestfallen. He never let anyone see him that way at school.

Beau and his mother had been in a car crash. Apart from his leg, Beau apparently made it out relatively unscathed. His mother hadn't.

Her arms were crossed, and she had this bemused expression on her face as she looked back and forth between the two of us.

My fingers faltered as I started to worry that I hadn't thought this through.

At a few weeks shy of eighteen, I’d sat through so many hearing tests over the past nearly five years as doctors tried to determine the severity of my hearing loss, I could almost administer one to myself.

Nobody liked being poked and prodded in the ears or having your hearing tested when it was pretty obvious you had none.

Some of the best things in my life happened without my being able to hear, like excelling in my studies at Pratt, meeting Melissa, meeting Nina and Beau...

As hard as I may have tried to follow Kathleen’s advice and just be patient, I trudged my way through another twenty-four hours of a grueling wait before the email came.

It took an insane amount of self-control to keep my phone tucked away in my backpack for the rest of class.

I thought I might find a little sliver of relief seeing Beau and his quirky smile, but that didn't happen when he signed, HELLO.

He seemed to be absorbing all the anger I felt dissipating inside me.

As irksome as it was, wouldn’t it just be better to brush this incident off and keep looking for another job?

Something in Mrs. Stephens’ expression seemed a tad bit more shrewd than normal.

We got into a routine of getting right down to business, Kathleen interpreting as she stood behind Mrs. Stephens’ desk while we discussed my current grades, filled out the necessary forms to register for orientation, and the like.

I grudgingly had to accept she had a point.

I held myself with as much dignity as I could muster, pressing the office’s doorbell and waiting to get buzzed in.

There were a bunch of picnic tables set up in the small courtyard outside the cafeteria, and I had my pick since almost no one was going to venture out into the cold to enjoy their sandwiches.

I started tapping out a beat on the tabletop with my fingers, trying to formulate my thoughts into something that would make sense.

The earnest and concerned look on his face was so endearing I couldn't keep the tiny smile from tugging at my lips.

The earnest and concerned look on his face was so endearing I couldn't keep the tiny smile from tugging at my lips.

I looked to Beau for backup, but all he did was go palms up as if to say, This is Nina's show here.
REALLY? I signed with an involuntary wince.

They both said, “Happy birthday!” rather than signing it, their arms full of birthday paraphernalia.

I got another round of them signing HAPPY BIRTHDAY to me and somehow I managed to respond with a feeble, THANK YOU.

I was by no means the avid reader Beau was, and yet I was still very touched by the battered copy of Jane Eyre I now held in my hands.

Written underneath that was a quote from the novel.
“I am no bird, and no net ensnares me.”

Why would Beau ever want me to change this quintessential part of myself?

When the moment stretched on between us with seemingly no end in sight, I gave up.

It usually took a herculean amount of effort on my part to be honest when it came to touchy feely stuff like this, but since I’d already told Mom everything else, I might as well come right out with the rest of it.

Why he wasn't getting this was just baffling to me.

My mind would veer off every few minutes and I would start to think of everything I wanted to say to Beau, how badly I wanted him to understand that I did not need this kind of “help” from him.

I didn't need him to be my able-bodied savior.

I refused to believe the utter crap Jackson just spouted off, that Beau was only pursuing something with me to get brownie points for dating a disabled chick.

No matter this rut we were in, Beau would never be that cruel.

I felt myself begin to smile despite wanting to keep my cool and collected façade going.

Time to throw out all the misconceptions about hearing and Deaf people and start over.

I felt my voice trail off at the sight of a familiar car zipping into the parking lot, bouncing over one of the speed bumps as it parked haphazardly in the closest spot to the clinic.