Danny and Olivier

Part 1- Danny and Olivier



 Some people meet in coffee shops. Some, in airplanes. But Danny met Olivier in the secondhand bookstore on the corner of 17th Avenue and 19th Avenue.


Like any other ordinary 16-year-old guy, Danny hated his parents. He wanted to be rid of them, mainly because he had no privacy whatsoever. His mother read his journal and song-writing books while his step-father went through his laptop. It didn't help that he was voluntarily mute since the seventh grade. Danny had turned to all black and Doc Martens, and his parents despised that even more. Danny didn't think that his parents would ever know that he liked guys. Or why he was mute.

And they would never know how abandoned he felt when they constantly weren't there for him.


 Olivier, on the other hand, wasn't voluntarily mute.

He was deaf. He hated being deaf sometimes- he couldn't listen to music, he had to communicate with his hands, he had to write things out on a little notebook he kept in his back pocket for people to understand him. But he loved his parents to no end. They supported him. They loved him. And they definitely knew that he adored his own gender.


 

 Olivier, at this moment, stood on the grey carpet, flipping through an old poetry book by Shel Silverstein, what he read as a little boy. He felt a wave of nostalgia as he recalled his dad tucking him in bed, kissing his forehead, and immediately started holding the book up for them both so that they could read together silently, stopping every once in a while to communicate.


When Olivier looked up, his nostalgia gone, he noticed a guy about his age, considerably shorter than him, decked out in all black with weird, clangy boots on his ankles, struggling to reach the top shelf for a Langston book. The boy met Olivier's eyes, but broke away and stood on tip-toe once more.


Olivier walked over, stood on his toes and reached for the hard brown cover of the book and handed it to the boy. He's pretty cute, Olivier thought, smiling at him.


 Danny, on impulse, made the sign for thank you in sign language, then turned away. Olivier was surprised and made the sign for you're welcome, after tapping the boy on the shoulder.

Danny stared at Olivier's hand and watched as it made its signs. Danny didn't think that anyone would actually understand him. Olivier pointed to his ears, and Danny understood.

Finally. Someone who understood.


 He looked over at the brown haired boy who had grabbed the book for him, then slowly took out a piece of paper he kept in his back pocket.

Danny, he wrote slowly, swirling his y.


 Olivier.


 And that's how they met.