Deaf [A One Direction Fanfic] -Amy's Adventures Book 1- #Wattys2014

Chapter 1

~Amy's POV~

I wake up to my friend Mandi shaking my shoulder. I groan, sitting up and rubbing my eyes. 'What do you want?' I sign, annoyed.

'Amy, it's almost noon! There are adopters coming soon!' My best friend signs quickly, excited. I nod, standing up and walking over to the closet we share and pulling out the first shirt I see and a random pair of jeans, taking them into the bathroom and changing. When I get out, Mandi laughs, pointing to my shirt. Or should I say, her shirt. I grabbed one of her band tees, and now five boys are smiling at me when I look down at my chest. One Direction, Mandi's latest craze. She's a hardcore Directioner, or at least I think that's what they're called. I'm not much of a fan, but I don't particularly like bands or singers in general because I can't exactly hear them. Mandi stops laughing and grabs my hand, pulling me out of the room and down to the adoption hall.

While we wait for the adopters, I start thinking about how unlikely it is that I'll ever get adopted. I mean, when I was one, my parents and I were in a car accident that cost them their lives and me my hearing. So now, eight years later, I'm a deaf orphan waiting for someone to come along and adopt me. Well, that's what Mandi says, but I'm pretty sure that I'm just waiting until I'm 18 and can get out of here. Mandi is another orphan I met when I came. She's the same age as me, but she's been here since she was a baby and she doesn't remember her family. Mandi was my roommate, and still is, so she helped me through the awkward beginnings of my deafness, or whatever it's called, and we've been best friends ever since.

When I finally tune back in to the real world, courtesy of Mandi pulling obnoxiously on my sleeve, I find myself face-to-face with a young woman who is smiling brightly. Her mouth moves, so she must be saying something, but I haven't learned to read lips yet, so I'm clueless. I simply stare at her mutely while she waits for an answer. Oh, there's another thing. I can't really talk. I never learned to talk before I lost my hearing, and I haven't been able to learn now, either. Mandi apparently finally decides to tell the poor woman why I won't say anything, because her mouth starts moving and the woman smiles sadly before moving on. I sigh, looking down. Eventually Mandi takes my arm again, signaling that the adoptions are over, so we walk back to our room dejectedly. Not that I'm surprised, but it would have been nice to know that someone cared about me. Lost in my thoughts, I trip on a stair and fall backward, my arm wrenched out of Mandi's grip as I roll down the stairs. My head hits the ground with a crash, and through my swimming vision I can see Mandi yelling for someone before I black out.

~Liam's POV~

I find myself looking at her picture once again, wishing I could help her. I was at summer camp when I got the news that my parents had died, and when I left the camp I went straight to an orphanage. I spent 6 years there until I finally got out when I was 18, but the entire time I never stopped thinking about my sister. She was in the car with my parents, my little baby sister, and she somehow survived. However, she lost her hearing in the accident. She was sent to an orphanage somewhere in England, and I never found out. So here I am, on the 9th anniversary of my parents death, trying to avoid my friends and their cheer. Because today isn't only my parents death day, it's also August 29th. My birthday.

I'm glad we're on break from tour, because I really don't feel like doing anything today. I stopped wanting to celebrate my birthday 9 years ago, and we didn't really do much in the orphanage, anyways, but now the lads are convinced that I should be celebrating. So I'm locked in my room, the one picture of my sister I have in my hand, waiting for two things. One, the tears to come like they do every year when I think about how I failed again at finding my sister. And two, for my friends to realize that if they really try they can just pick the lock and get in here.

I don't know when exactly it happens, but I'm suddenly aware that I'm crying when a tear hits the glass covering of the photo, blurring her face slightly. I don't even try to fight back the tears, I just let them come, let them cover her picture and my face, while I sob louder and louder until everyone in the house can probably hear it. That thought is confirmed when someone starts banging on my door and four voices yell at me- with my mind the way it is I can't tell who's who. One of them eventually figures out that my door can be unlocked, and soon I'm surrounded by my four worried friends. One takes the photo from my hands, and I immediately grab my knees, hugging them to my chest as I cry. I'm faintly aware of someone rubbing circles in my back, and through my blurry vision I see three scared faces as I start feeling lightheaded. I sway a little and my eyes slip closed, and I barely hear four voices screaming my name before my head hits the ground and I black out.

When I open my eyes again, I'm staring at a white tile ceiling. I sit up quickly, then groan when I'm hit by a wave of dizziness. I hear a gasp and lean back, holding my head as I become aware of the pounding pain in the back of it. I hear footsteps, and soon a familiar blond enters my view range, his eyes wide. "Guys! He's awake!" Niall yells loudly, making me grimace as the pain in my head increases.

"Niall, you're being very loud." I comment, causing him to turn back to me.

"Oh. Sorry, Liam." He says sheepishly, rubbing his neck. I smile, shaking my head, which throws me into another dizzy wave. "Careful!" Niall exclaims, putting a hand on my arm. I look down, finally noticing that I'm in a hospital bed. Wait. I'm in a hospital?!

"Niall, why am I in a hospital?! What happened?!? Where are the other guys?!?!" I ask rapidly.

"Calm down, Liam." Harry says, walking through a curtain and into the room. I wonder if there's another person on the other side?

"You got lightheaded from crying so much, fell off your bed, and gave yourself a concussion. You've only been out for a few hours." Zayn says.

"Hours?! What time is it?" I ask. Louis looks at his phone and sighs.

"It's about 2 in the afternoon." He says, and I nod. An awkward silence fills the room, and my thoughts drift back to the curtain.

"Lads, is there someone on the other side of that curtain?" I ask. Harry and Niall nod, while Zayn and Louis look up in surprise, pulled from their thoughts.

"It's a little girl, she looks to be about ten. She's wearing one of our shirts, so we tried to talk to her earlier, but she just looked at us and didn't say anything. At first, she wasn't looking at me, and it was like she didn't hear me!" Harry says. My eyes widen.

"Harry, is there a possibility that she's deaf?" I ask. All four boys grin, realizing what I'm saying. They all know about my sister, and about how much I want to find her. I know sign language, I figured it'd be useful if I ever found my sister. And I guess it's useful now. "I'm going to talk to her." I say, standing before Niall can stop me. I regret that decision immediately when I'm hit by another wave of dizziness and nearly collapse. Luckily, Niall grabs my arm and helps me regain my balance. The lads know it's useless to argue with me, so Harry and Zayn each grab one of my arms and help me walk over to the curtain and beyond it. When we arrive, I sit down in the nearest chair, which happens to be a wheelchair, breathless. Wow, I must have really done something to my head.

There's a girl sitting up in the hospital bed that looks much like my own, and another girl by her side, facing away from us. The girl in the bed sees the lads and I and points, alerting the other girl, who turns around. Her eyes widen, and I wave. "Hi?" I say carefully. Like Harry said, the girl in the bed is wearing one of our shirts, so I don't want them to fangirl. The girl in the bed starts frantically signing, and I smile. "Her name is Amy, and her friend is Mandi. She recognizes us from her shirt, but it isn't hers, it's Mandi's. She also apologizes for not talking to you guys earlier, she can't talk or hear. And she's an orphan, as is Mandi." I translate. Amy and Mandi both look at me in shock, and I start to sign. 'I learned sign language a while back because my sister is deaf.' Amy and Mandi nod, and Niall grins. He learned sign language as well, so we both laugh at the clueless expressions of the other three lads. Mandi joins in, and then Amy starts to laugh. Her laugh is so sweet it silences me immediately. So sweet, and so familiar, even though I've only heard it once. All at once, everything clicks. 'Amy, is your name Amanda?' I sign. She nods, and my mind whirs. Amanda, deaf, ten years old, an orphan. My sister.