Silence

Chapter 2

(A/N) As promised, here’s Chapter 2 of Silence! Thank you for voting/commenting/reading and I like your beautiful faces. I hope you like it, because it’s not that good, but love you all!

Olivia’s POV

So, for the past two years, I’ve been living in silence. It’s so weird living in a neighborhood where everyone treats you like a little kid. If I ever walk outside of my house there’s always a person there, asking me if I need anything, and it annoys the crap out of me.

After losing my ability to speak clearly, life has sucked. Haven is the only person other than my family that I actually communicate with. I lost contact with everyone I had known before the accident. I now concentrate on school, and that’s all what really matters. No boys. No drama. My goal now is to get accepted into UCLA and become a nurse. As long as my life was quiet and simple, I’m happy.

When I woke up this morning, I was drenched in sweat. My dream last night was so confusing. I was talking, TALKING to my boyfriend. First of all, I was TALKING!!! Something I hadn’t done in forever. Then, there was my boyfriend… What??? Okay. Even if I had a guy friend, which I don’t, there is no way I would have a boyfriend.

Luckily, I woke up in time for school. I looked over at the clock, and it read 8:23. School starts at 9:00, so at least I had some time to get ready. I cleaned up and applied a little make up on, but only a small layer of foundation and some eyeliner and mascara.

Slipping on some shoes and grabbing my backpack and textbooks, I walked my way to school. Luckily, it was only a five minute walk, so I got there in time. At ten to 9:00, our buzzers went off, and so did the school lights, signaling it was time to get ready for class. Considering most of the people that went to my school were deaf, there were no bells in our school. Instead, each student had to carry a buzzer around with them.

The rest of the day went as normal. I barely raised my hand in class, and only responded when a teacher would call on me. The last period of the day was Speech Therapy, and today, we had a vocal test. All we had to do was say this: “My name is ___”, and then you would say your name. Simple, right? No. After all the times I’ve practiced, all I can say is, “Meh nem eh Oliwa.” At that point, it would get me a B-. Surprisingly, the students in my class are amazing at speaking. There’s this girl, Bay. You wouldn’t believe that she’s deaf. She just sounds like she has a cold when she speaks.

Of course, she’s the teacher’s pet and always gets A’s in that class. I, on the other hand, barely manage to pass on an AP level. Now, you may be thinking that, why is there even an AP class for speaking? Well, it’s extremely hard for us. Most of the kids that go here do not have the ability to hear what the words can sound like, and yet they sound perfectly fine. Yet, here I am, able to hear and understand every single word and how it’s pronounced, yet I sound like an idiot when I try to speak.

I sat down next to my vocal partner, Sarah. She was one of the helpers that would advise us on how to pronounce certain words or such, and she was definitely my favorite of them all. After listening to people recite the words, it was finally my turn.

I looked over to Sarah, and she gave me a reassuring wink. Shuddering, I walked up to the front of the classroom. The teacher motioned for me to start, and I opened my mouth.

“My naime ish Oli-Oliyia.” Damn. That was pretty good except for the fact that I was talking slower than a snail would crawl. After I sat back down in my seat, Sarah congratulated me, although I found no reason for it. The remainder of the class went and the teacher gave us our homework. It was so make the “S” sound along with “Sh” and “St”.

Luckily, it was a Friday, so I could work on it over the weekend. At 3:45, our buzzers went off, indicating the end of school. I grabbed my books and signed goodbye to Sarah and the teacher.

When I got to my locker, I found Haven standing there, as usual. We always hung out after school on Fridays, whether it was for homework or walking around the park and going to the mall. The good thing about the deaf and mute school was that the homework usually wasn’t written homework, unless you took history, science, or math. Of course, I took all of those. At least it wasn’t that much to do.

“Hey,” I signed, placing my books on the floor and I entered my combination onto my lock.

“Hey.” She signed back. After having to speak ASL for two years, it’s been a habit to look at someone if I was ever to have a conversation, even if they could speak. That way, I wouldn’t miss anything they said.

“So, what are we going to do after school today?” I asked. I quickly grabbed my bag and closed my locker. Sarah and I walked over to the front of the school, through the silence of the school except for the few words exchange between teachers and helpers. Another upside to a deaf and mute school. Most of the time, it was so quiet that you could hear crickets chirping, unlike public schools whose noise could break your eardrums.

“Actually, I was going to talk to you about that. Anthony asked me out on a date today, so I have to skip out today.” I looked at her sign, and I couldn’t help but feel a wave of disappointment and annoyance rush over me. Of course, I was glad for her. Anthony was her longtime crush, and he finally asked her out, but what was I supposed to do today?

“Oh. It’s fine.” I kept a smile on my face as I moved my hands. She waved goodbye and walked the other direction towards Anthony.

It didn’t exactly surprise me that he asked her out though. She’s beautiful, with auburn, wavy hair and perfect figure. She had light blue eyes and a full rack. Something that I definitely did not have. My ass was small and bony and my bra size was a 34B, while Haven wore a 38D.

I walked home, but took the long way to make sure I passed by the ice cream store along the way. As I was walking inside, I accidentally bumped into someone and I ended up on my bum on the sidewalk. I looked up and instinctively signed an “I’m really sorry” at the stranger, even though I was pretty sure he wouldn’t understand what I’m doing. I probably look like a crazy person, moving my hands in random directions.

I looked up at him, and couldn’t help but realize who he was. With his dark, brown hair and such intricate features, he wasn’t hard to recognize. Standing in front of me was the person who had motivated me to participate in the activity that had changed my life forever. Standing in front of me was Austin.

(N/A) If you haven’t read my other story, He’s the One, you should. It’s a One Direction fan fiction, and I’m not sure if you like stories like that, but I would really like you if you could check it out! Also, if you haven’t noticed, I really like to end a chapter with a cliffhanger. If you hate me, I’m sorry. I love you all.

Anyways, I hope you liked this chapter. Not a lot happened, but I’m still sort of introducing the whole situation. I don’t know a lot about deaf/mute people, so forgive me if I get anything wrong.

And don’t forget to vote/comment/fan. How about 10 more reads/comments/votes for chapter 3?