Like the Malloys, the Schneiders had another kid, a hearing one, which made things worse for the contrast it provided. While Jamie had swirled through the foster system, his siblings stayed in the home. For her part, Emily was nearly always dressed in her older brother’s enormous clothes, which was no crime, of course, but it added insult to injury when combined with other persistent parental efforts to forget her. By 5:00 p.m., February was in a dark place, mulling over how the Schneiders’ propensity for neglect was particularly irrational given that Emily spoke well and was one of the most successful CI users at the school. As if these things were value-addeds. As if a child who could be made “hearing” enough was more worthy of love.
She pulled her cell from her back pocket and made the call to the sheriff, admonished the part of her brain that would even entertain the ranking of children. But whether or not she banished the thoughts from her own head did little to help Emily, or any of the kids whose parents’ affections were distributed on a sliding scale tethered to how well said kid could perform normalcy. By the time she hung up, her rage had cooled and soured into despair at the thought of what might happen to Emily, and all the others like her, next year, when her parents were forced to care for her full-time.
Come on, February said after a while. We can wait in my office. I’ve got cookies.
She heard sirens in the distance as she walked the girl inside. Though she had called the nonemergency line, she assumed it was the sheriff heading their way. Must be a slow day in Colson County.
i said, how was school? If I’m signing you can’t i-g-n-o-r-e me!
Charlie was a little shocked by how adept her father was becoming at sign language. His vocabulary was limited, but conceptually it seemed to come easy to him, and he got by on fingerspelling or talking around a word just fine. In their night class, he’d already surpassed a couple of the other parents who’d been at it longer, moms for whom the effort of learning a new language was obviously challenging. So Charlie was glad that her father was making progress, but also angry that he hadn’t tried to learn sooner. She wondered what he’d been afraid of—failure? his wife?—and what her childhood might have looked like if she’d had a bastion of language, however small, to which she could have run when she needed it.
Sorry, was thinking.
Daydreaming, you mean.
More like drowning in a pool of her own mortification, Charlie thought, the pizza outing’s events still replaying in her head. She’d been too cowardly to say anything much to Kayla about what had happened between her roommate and Austin, beyond apologizing for her own dearth of knowledge about Black ASL. Kayla had brushed her off, saying, Girl, you don’t know ASL either, and they’d both laughed a little, but that had been it. Charlie felt contrite on Austin’s behalf—after all, she’d been the one to cajole Kayla into coming along in the first place.
Still, when Charlie pulled her own phone from her pocket, she found herself disappointed, then repulsed at that disappointment, to see none of the four new messages on the screen were from Austin.
Comingover.to drop smtng of okay?
*off
Aare u hokme?
*home!
Shit, Charlie said to her father. Mom’s coming over.
Now?
She wants to drop something off, she says.
What?
No idea.
Her mother was parked out front, leaning on her car and poking at her phone with one long acrylic nail. She seemed flustered by their arrival, as if Charlie and her father had shown up at her house instead of the other way around.
Sorry, I figured you’d be—she glanced again at her phone—home by now. Anyway, just wanted to drop this off.
Charlie didn’t know what her mother was talking about, but she could see her father remove his glasses and rub at his eyes, a tic she’d come to know was his attempt at disguising exasperation. Her mother began rooting through the contents of her purse, finally drawing out a small white box, the shape of which Charlie recognized right away.
Popped down to the clinic to grab this. So you have it for school and stuff.
Dad just picked me up for Thanksgiving break. We don’t have class.
Oh, well. Anyway, she said. Here it is.
Charlie tried to maintain a neutral expression, but she could feel her own frustration surfacing. Her mother had to have known she’d be out on break; she just wanted Charlie to show up to Thanksgiving dinner with her implant on. Why couldn’t her mother ever say what she was really thinking? Were they really still playing this fucking game after all these years?
* * *
—
Once, at the clinic, Charlie had seen a boy with a cochlear implant talking on the phone. At first, she entertained conspiracy theories. Maybe he was an actor hired by Edge, and this was a rehearsed conversation. Maybe there wasn’t anyone on the other end at all. It didn’t feel so far-fetched, given the chasm between the task this boy seemed to be enjoying and the subpar work the thing in her own head was doing. Given what she knew of implant sales reps.
In that same hospital, she’d also come upon two women with name tags and pencil skirts plucking their eyebrows before the bathroom vanity, one bragging to the other how much product she’d sold, that she was going to Biloxi for the weekend and drinks were on her. At the time, Charlie didn’t understand much beyond a gut-level aversion to the woman’s smarm, but thinking back on it later, she realized that someone must have earned a commission on her own mother’s worst nightmare.
So it was hard to watch her mother now, gingerly removing from its case the processor she’d driven out of her way to retrieve. She handled it like a family heirloom, but for Charlie it felt more like watching an alcoholic have just one beer.
They preset your last MAPping on here, her mother said. But I made an appointment for an adjustment if we need it.
We don’t need it, thought Charlie, though she said nothing aloud. Instead she took the processor, hung it over her ear, swept her hair back, and attached the magnet.
How does it feel?
Charlie was used to being asked questions about her deafness, but the one that really irked her was “What does hearing with an implant sound like?” It wasn’t the all-time dumbest inquiry—someone at Jefferson had once asked her if her ears got cold in winter—but it was the one she most hated, perhaps because it bothered her that she would never know the answer. How could she know what it was like when she had nothing to compare it to? But now, the three of them standing there looking at one another, Charlie cocking her head in discomfort, her mother all hope like a helium balloon, she felt more sad than annoyed.
Feels good, I think, said Charlie. Might take a while to tell.
Of course, said her mother. Have to get used to it.
Charlie nodded, shifted her weight between her feet. She wondered whether other people felt so awkward in front of their mothers.
Well, I better go. Ms. Sweet Potato Pie costumes wait for no woman.
In a different mood, Charlie might’ve had a good joke about pageants named after starches.
I’ll be over Wednesday night then, said Charlie.
Her mother made the one-armed reach that Charlie understood was her version of a hug, then returned to her car, where she backed out of her parking spot a little too fast, as if she were being released from captivity.
Your mom’s just trying to help.
Doing a shitty job.
Her father sighed.
The goal of your implant was always—
To make her life easier?
To make your life easier.
This makes my life easier.
Charlie held her hands outstretched toward her father.
Yeah, she guessed wrong, he said. But her heart was in the right place. She has her regrets.
Regrets? I’ve got a chunk of metal inside my head!
And what if you never had it? Never learned to speak at all?
Plenty of people don’t talk at all, she said, though really Austin was the only one she knew for sure. And they’ve had more normal lives than me.
Normal? he said. Isn’t that what you’re always raging against?
Why are you defending her?
I’m only saying she loves you. Tough love, maybe—
Was that what it was with you two? “Tough love?”
Oh no, she hated me, he said.
Charlie groaned.
But she doesn’t hate you. Despite both your best efforts.
I have homework, Charlie said.
Now?