Alaskan Nights (A Law and Order: SVU fanfic)

Ch.27

Just a quick note about the sign language in this chapter, wherever you see dialogue in italics from now on, it's a conversation totally in sign. Bold dialogue is when the speaker is both signing and speaking. If you know anything about sign then you know that the sentence structure isn't as we have it in English, but for the sake of understanding, it will be written as traditional dialogue. Also, the way that I envisioned it is that though the English dialogue is complex for the hearing (and in this case for your understanding), the signs that anyone uses for Quinn are very much elementary and may even be completely different words (though similar gist) than what they speak for Elliot/Rebecca/Susie/Paul/Olivia.

Olivia pushes Quinn's overgrown bangs out of his face and places another light kiss into his wild hair as she carefully glides down the stairs. Quinn catches her thumb as she rubs it against his left cheek in an attempt to rouse his heavy eyelids open. Elliot takes this as evidence that he was indeed still tired. It was just minutes earlier when they walked in from the deck that Olivia had noted that his cry was probably one for attention as he hadn't been asleep for long. But while she knew this, she said that couldn't bear to let him cry, especially as she'd spent so long away from him this morning. She had been right though, because even from the distance as they descended the stairs, the boy was still visibly drowsy, though he was quiet because he was now in his mother's arms.

"Okay." Olivia finally says after a few minutes of swaying the boy just at the base of the stairs. She walks the short distance to the kitchen peninsula and sets him down. Quinn immediately begins to whine and starts to reach for her, but after Olivia makes a quick motion with her hand, he seems to settle slightly. She then reaches into her pocket and retrieves a slender black case and plucks from it what he immediately recognises as hearing aids. It then dawns on him that he'd somehow forgotten this important part of his everchanging puzzle— his son was in fact deaf and while he'd only seen him wearing the devices maybe once before, it was definitely an integral part of his life, a part that he'd never dealt with before.

Olivia nods for him to come over and so he rounds the peninsula and comes face to face with the mother of his child across the tiled countertop. Quinn begins to quietly whimper once more and so she rubs her hands down his back, while placing a few kisses on his forehead before turning attention back to him. She holds her hand out and offers Elliot one of the tiny devices. "He hates them, with a passion. We're supposed to gradually increase the time per day that he wears them but he still only tolerates it for maybe an hour...which isn't ideal but..."

"How'd you find out about it?"

Her eyes flicker between him and the child before her. "We took him in at around 3 months old because he just stopped responding to sound. I mean, in hindsight, he wasn't ever really responsive but we didn't really pick it up until then... Anyways, we took him in and they said that he had a condition called Otosclerosis. It basically means that he has bony growths on the bones in his ears, which affect his hearing."

Elliot rubs his hand against his rough skin. "Do the aids fix it or does he need surgery or...?"

"Well...in his case, the growths are still progressing so he'll need surgery...pretty soon actually. They may have to insert prosthetic bones if there ends up doing too much damage."

"Damn." Elliot sighs. He runs his hand through his hair and down his neck. "Is it genetic?" he asks as he studies the device.

"It can be...there isn't a hard and fast cause. But they've suggested that it just may be in his case because the progression of the growths meant that he was born with it." she replies. "I didn't know your history but from what I could remember you never mentioned it so...Does anyone else in your family have anything similar?"