Blinded by the Light: Drabbles

Drabble Seven: Slate and Stylus

'Bri, look what Cynthia gave me at school today!'

Once Brian had picked up the coat Roger had just sloppily discarded on the countertop and decently put it on the coat hook next to the door, he turned around to find his lover diving deeply into the backpack on the kitchen table. Roger first pulled out a few alphabet cards and work sheets before he eventually fished out the item he had been looking for – that was, Brian assumed that the object he was holding was what he had been searching, judging by the wide smile on Roger's face. For a second, Brian was glad that Roger couldn't see him, because he was afraid he could not flash him a bright smile back; not as long as he had absolutely no idea what the thing Roger was holding was. He therefore stared at the unknown item in puzzlement, his brain spinning to come up with a solution to the question which purpose the tool could possibly serve.

The material and shape of it, a thin, rectangular piece of plastic, didn't provide any useful information, so Brian focussed on the remarkable aspects of the item instead. When he looked at it a little better, he saw that it consisted of two layers of aluminium pressed against each other, which didn't seem to be flat and solid – there were rows of holes on one side, small gaps that turned the upper layer of aluminium into a grid. Unfortunately for Brian, this only turned the purpose of it into even more than a mystery than it had been before. What in the world would people enrolled in braille class need a weird-looking aluminium grid for?

'Brian? Are you still here?' Roger eventually asked when the silence in the kitchen lasted too long, and Brian rubbed over his own forehead while replying somewhat awkwardly.

'Yes, baby, of course. I was just looking at this...' Damnit, what on earth could it be? 'this tool. Great that they gave you one to use at home!' Brian said as excitedly as possible, hoping his insecurity about the unknown thing wasn't audible in his voice. Luckily for him, Roger didn't seem to notice, because he happily continued talking about it.

'Yes, they said that the only way to learn how to use a slate is to practice as much as possible,' Roger said as he fluttered around the kitchen table, searching for the place where his chair was standing.

A slate! That explains something, Brian thought to himself, until he looked at it again and realised that it did not, in fact, explain anything; it looked nothing like the kind of slate he knew, and on top of that, he had no idea how Roger was supposed to use the thing that apparently was a slate. He remembered that Roger had lately indeed been talking endlessly about using a slate in class to write braille, and Brian had always just smiled and nodded – and then remembered that he had to vocalise these pleasantries because Roger couldn't hear any of these – as if he had known exactly what he was talking about. In fact, though, he had no idea. Before Roger had brought up slate used for Braille, Brian hadn't even known it was possible to not just read but also write in braille yourself. The embossed dots that represented letters did not seem to be easily reproducible by anything other than a special printing machine, but according to his partner's stories, there seemed to be a way to do this manually. And apparently, the way to do this was through the rectangular piece of aluminium that started to look more odd the longer Brian looked at it.

'... So they suggested I should take one home, so I could make some homework assignments with it,' Roger rattled on, and Brian saw his chance to subtly yet effectively break through the annoying feeling of misunderstanding towards the tool.

'Well, if you have to practice anyway, would you mind to give me a little demonstration?' Brian asked, and Roger seemed all too glad to do so. He flopped down on his chair and pulled Brian's back in a clumsy but sweet attempt to invite him to sit down next to him. The guitarist sat down next to Roger, who in the meantime emptied the contents of his bag – a book, alphabet sheets, homework sheets, a handful of white pieces of paper, a weird-looking needle with plastic handle – on the space before him on the kitchen table, next to what was supposed to be a slate. Brian watched while Roger rearranged the items; he put a piece of paper in front of him, the homework sheets above it, and the slate and needle, a new object of mystery to Brian, on the right side of it.