Solangelo One-Shot Collection

🏳️‍🌈Deaf (1/2)🏳️‍🌈

(Nico's shadow travel is dangerous, it's a known fact. Occasionally, he'll lose parts of himself in the shadows such as his taste buds in the HOO series or in this story's case, his eardrums. ⚠️Slight angst ig?⚠️)

~Nico POV~

I opened my eyes to see the familiar sheets of an infirmary cot. Great, I shadow travelled and it landed me in the infirmary. Will's gonna be so upset with me.

Why is everything so quiet?(My room went dead silent as I typed that.)

I sat up. Something grabbed me from behind and a yelp slipped past my lips. Er...I thought a yelp slipped out but there wasn't a sound. I looked at the person hugging me. Will. his lips are moving but there's no sound. I gave him a confused look only to get one in response. It looked like he said something else but still no sound. What's happening?

'Will-' I tried to say but not a peep.

~Will POV~

"Will." Nico said. "Will. Damn. Why can't I say anything?"

"You're talking right now though?" I replied.

"What? I can't hear you." He said.

Nico stared at me, looking puzzled. A look of worry washed over his face. He snapped his fingers by each ear. Worry turned to panic as he snapped several more times.

Then it hit me.

"I can't hear! I...I can't hear anything!" Nico said.

His breathing quickened, becoming sharp and ragged. Tears formed in his eyes.

"I-I can't hear!" He said.

He started to shake and tears slid down his cheeks. I waved my hand in front of his face, getting his attention. I took a deep breath, raising each finger on one hand then slowly let out the breath lowering each finger again. I repeated this a few times, Nico following my lead. After a while, his breathing steadied and he stopped shaking though tears still rolled down his face. I wiped them away then looked around the room.

"What are you doing?" Nico asked, kind of loudly.

I found a pad of paper and a pen. I sat down next to him on the cot and wrote on the paper. It took him several minutes to read it.

"Can you kiss me?" He asked, confused by my question. "Is that what it says?"

I nodded.

"Sure..." He blushed.

I pecked his cheek and he smiled. My kisses can heal, maybe it'll work on his hearing.

"Can you hear me now?" I asked.

He looked at me confused.

I flipped the page and started writing again.

"You're a healer, you deal with a lot of people with many conditions." He said. "Don't you know sign language? That seems like something you should probably know."

I stopped writing and scribbled out what I'd already written and wrote something else. Nico spent less time trying to decipher through his dyslexia since it was shorter.

He signed, 'yes, I know sign language'.

'I didn't know that' I signed back.

'Do you think this is permanent?' he asked, frowning.

I shrugged and replied, 'not sure but hopefully not. Gods. How many times have I told you that shadow travel is dangerous?'

He rolled his eyes and signed, 'I can't hear but you're still pestering me about that?'