A Silent Death

by Peter May

  Sergio told her he had just turned twenty-one. He was studying online for a degree in Spanish. The internet was relatively young, but was already opening up possibilities for the deaf that could never have been imagined. The relationship with his tutors was conducted entirely onscreen, and they had no idea that he was deaf. ‘It makes me feel like a normal person again,’ he said. ‘There’s something about being deaf that seems to scare people. As if it’s a disease they might catch. Others think you are just stupid, and they treat you like an imbecile.’ He smiled. ‘But why am I telling you? You must know.’

  Ana nodded sadly. ‘I know that I’ve lost all my friends. You sort of get used to just being on your own.’ She smiled. ‘After a while I kind of got to like it. You start relying on yourself, because you can’t rely on anyone else.’

  ‘Exactly right. But that’s why I love the internet. You can just be yourself, and nobody’s judging you. Nobody knows that you can’t hear them, cos you don’t need to. We could meet online in a chat room if you like.’ The idea seemed to excite him.

  Ana’s smile faded and her eyes turned down towards the table.

  ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘We don’t have internet at home.’

  ‘Oh.’ Sergio was crestfallen. ‘Maybe you could ask your dad?’

  ‘I don’t think he can afford it.’

  ‘Well, then, you’ll just have to come here three nights a week, and we can make this our real-life chat room.’ He grinned. ‘And I’ll teach you proper sign language.’

  She pulled a face.

  ‘No, honestly, it’s good. When you get the hang of it you can really express yourself. You forget that you’re not actually speaking out loud.’

  She shrugged. ‘Maybe.’ She paused. ‘Still not sure I’m coming back, though.’ She watched his face fall again – an odd expression, but for the first time she realized how apposite it was. His face really did fall, and she didn’t have the heart to keep playing hard to get. It made her laugh. ‘But if you ask nicely . . .’

  His relief was patent, and he grinned. ‘I’ll do better than that. I’ll take you out for tapas. I don’t just have to see you here.’

  ‘Woah!’ she raised her hands. ‘Not so fast. We just met, remember?’

  ‘Life’s too short for wasting time.’

  ‘Maybe. But it seems to me that you’re asking me out on a date when you really don’t know anything about me.’

  ‘Well, how am I going to get to know you if I don’t see you again?’

  ‘You can see me here.’

  His face lit up. ‘You’re coming back then?’

  She saw how he had trapped her into that. ‘I’ll think about it.’

  He beamed. ‘Well, think about tapas, too. And maybe a beer. We don’t want to spend our whole time surrounded by a bunch of old deaf people.’

  She laughed out loud. ‘One day, Sergio, we’ll be old deaf people, too.’ And she realized how much she liked saying his name, and how much she really did want to get to know him better. And she decided there and then that she would accept his offer to take her on a date. But she wouldn’t tell him just yet.

  *

  It was a couple of weeks before Ana plucked up the courage to tell her parents that she had been asked on a date by a young man at the centre. She needed a lift into Estepona. But she was completely unprepared for the reaction it provoked. She had been five times now to the centre, and on her previous visit had told Sergio that she would go for tapas with him.

  It was a hot summer’s night. Her father sat at the table wearing only a singlet and shorts, the local newspaper open in front of him. A pair of half-moon spectacles rested halfway down his nose and sweat darkened the white cotton of his vest where it stretched itself over his ample belly.

  He looked up, frowning, and said simply, ‘No.’

  Ana bristled. ‘What do you mean, no?’

  ‘Well, which part of the word don’t you understand?’

  She turned belligerent. ‘I understand that I’m seventeen years old and that if I want to go out with a boy, I’ll go out with a boy.’

  ‘As long as you’re under my roof you’ll do what I damned well tell you.’

  Her mother appeared at the kitchen door. ‘What do you even know about this boy?’

  ‘A lot.’

  ‘What age is he?’ her father said.

  ‘He’s twenty-one.’

  ‘Hah!’ He folded his newspaper shut and slapped a palm on the table. ‘Well, that settles it. Only one thing on his mind.’

  ‘How could you possibly know what’s on his mind?’ Ana was aware of her voice rising in pitch.

  ‘Because I was twenty-one myself once. I know what a young man thinks when he looks at a seventeen-year-old girl. The answer is no. And that’s an end to it.’

  Her mother cast a judgmental eye over her husband, wondering perhaps if those same things still went through his mind when he looked at a seventeen-year-old girl. She refocused on Ana. ‘You met him at the centre?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So he’s deaf?’

  ‘Yes, he is.’

  She gasped her frustration. ‘Holy Mary mother of God, Ana, could you not find yourself a normal boy?’

  Ana’s simmering anger started to boil over. ‘What do you mean, “normal”? Are you saying I’m not normal?’

  Her mother realized her mistake. ‘No,’ she said hastily. ‘But you need someone with normal hearing to make up for your lack of it. You know the doctor said it’s only going to get worse. One day you’ll not be able to hear at all. Then you’d be two deaf people.’

  Now her father slammed both palms down on the table. ‘Enough!’ he bellowed, and Ana was sure they must have heard him down on the coast. ‘You are NOT going out with him.’

  Ana felt hot tears fill her eyes. If only Isabella had been there to speak up for her. She was sure her parents would have listened to her sister. But the only one who was going to stand up for Ana was Ana herself. She got to her feet. ‘What are you going to do, tie me up? If I want to go out with Sergio, I’ll got out with Sergio. And if you won’t give me a lift into town I’ll just get the bus.’ She lifted her bag, slung it over her shoulder and stormed out of the living room, slamming the door behind her.

  *

  Sergio was waiting nervously for her outside the post office on the Paseo Maritimo, an elegant tree-lined promenade that ran the length of the seafront in Estepona. The chiringuito beach bars were full and the smell of fresh fish grilling on wooden embers filled the evening.

  She was nearly half an hour late, and had done her best on the bus to repair the damage to her face.

  ‘I really thought you’d stood me up,’ Sergio said. ‘Another five minutes and I’d have been off.’ Although Ana suspected he would have waited a lot longer. He peered at her in the fading light. ‘Have you been crying?’

  She shrugged it off. ‘Some bad news at home,’ she said. ‘But it’s okay, I don’t want anything to spoil our evening.’

  Concerned eyes lingered on her face for several long moments before Sergio took her hand and they began strolling slowly along the Paseo in the direction of the old port.

  Apartments rose on three and four levels above the shops and restaurants lining the broad Avenue del Carmen that swept down into town from the west. A fine, sandy beach stretched away to their left, and a gently foaming Mediterranean washed up along the shore, breathing softly into the night. It was cooling now, but the air was still soft on their skin.

  Ana liked the feel of her hand in his. It felt big and protective. Their arms swung together a little as they walked in an easy silence. Lip-reading, since they were both facing in the same direction, was not an option. And their hands were otherwise engaged.

  Ana had taken her first few lessons in signing, and spent most of her time with Sergio practising it. To her surprise it had come much more easily than she expected. But for now she was content just to feel close to him. Words were unimportant, and she let a
ll memory of the row with her parents slip away.

  Sergio took her to a tiny tapas bar in the port, squeezing past crowded tables on the terrace to find a quiet spot in the dark interior. The walkway outside was jammed with tourists and locals finding seats in restaurants and bars. The smell of woodsmoke and barbecued meats suffused the night air, and yachts bobbed gently in the dark on the moonlit waters of the marina. They ordered the house selection of tapas, and a waitress brought them seemingly endless plates of patatas bravas, albóndigas, langostinos, empanadas, tortitas . . . Sergio asked for two glasses of Rioja, and they sipped on its smooth velvety vanilla as they ate.

  Ana spoke and signed at the same time, Sergio correcting her as she went. Tea-light candles burned on their table, and tiny pinpoints of light danced in his dark eyes. ‘So,’ she said. ‘Once you have graduated, what is it you want to do?’

  ‘I want to teach,’ he said. ‘In a school for the deaf, or special needs pupils. I want to bring the world to children with problems and teach them that they are no different from anyone else. That there’s nothing to stop them from being whoever it is they want to be.’

  Ana felt her heart swell. ‘I wish I’d had someone like you to teach me. Maybe I wouldn’t have grown up believing that everyone else was better.’

  ‘Oh, Ana . . .’ He placed both of his hands over one of hers. ‘You mustn’t ever think that. You’re beautiful inside and out. You’re clever, you’re articulate, you’re funny.’ He paused and she felt his hands tighten their grip on hers. ‘I think you’re wonderful.’

  She blushed and glanced away, embarrassed by his directness, but filled with pleasure. And feelings of – she wasn’t quite sure what. Just feelings she had never had before.

  They ate their way through every plate, washing it all down with a second glass of wine. They talked and laughed and Ana thought, this is how it must be for ordinary people. For the first time in her life she forgot about her hearing difficulties, forgot that Sergio was deaf. Simply felt the pleasure of being alive, and enjoying the company of the person she was with.

  When it came time to go, and Sergio paid the bill, she got up from the table with reluctance, for the first time allowing thoughts to enter her mind of what might await her when she got home. In the port outside, bright lights obliterated the darkness, turning night into day, air filled with the sound of humanity at play. Sounds Sergio would never hear, and which registered only distantly for Ana. As they wove their way through the terrace Ana stumbled on someone’s bag lying on the floor and almost fell.

  Sergio caught her, and for a moment she found herself in his arms, safe from all the dangers that the night presented. He made sure she was steady on her feet before letting her go. She laughed it off. ‘I’m getting so clumsy. Tripping over things that I don’t seem to notice, bumping into people as I go past them.’

  Sergio laughed. ‘It’s the wine. I feel a little heady myself.’

  He took her hand and she leaned in to his side as they walked up out of the port to the bus stop in the Avenue del Carmen. They stood waiting for the bus and for the first time that night could find nothing to say. Something about the anticipation of parting silenced tongues and hands. They had spent many hours together at the centre, but this was their first time out alone, and Ana wondered how they would end it. Her mouth was dry, and her heart beat a little faster when she saw the lights of the bus turning on the roundabout. But she had no time to think about it before she felt Sergio’s arm around her waist, his face lowering itself to hers, his lips soft and warm brushing her mouth. She strained on tiptoes to kiss him, and they very nearly let the bus go past.

  When it came to a stop, Sergio held her hand as she stepped up into it, and she slumped into a seat at the front ignoring the lecherous grin of the driver.

  The twenty-minute drive back to Marviña passed in a blur, a confusion of thoughts and emotions. She tried not to think about her parents, but focus instead on the time she had spent with Sergio. But as her bus turned up the hill from the roundabout at Santa Ana de las Vides, she couldn’t prevent fears of what awaited her from creeping into her conscious thoughts.

  It seemed profoundly dark as she stepped off the bus into the Plaza del Vino. The square, she knew, was ringed with street lights, and she wondered for a moment if there had been a power cut. She heard rather than saw the bus pull away and the hand of fear closed around her heart and filled her with dread. Why couldn’t she see anything? It was as if the whole town was smothered in black dust. She was gripped almost immediately by a complete sense of disorientation. It was only a five-minute walk to the apartment, but she had no idea which way to go. She turned left, then right, stumbling over a kerbstone and nearly falling. She put her hands out ahead of her to avoiding walking into a wall or a building or a lamp post and wanted to call out for someone to help her. But at this hour the town was deserted. Shutters closed, bars emptied, lights out.

  Her fear was so great now it took almost physical form, rising up from her chest and into her throat, very nearly choking her. She staggered forwards, hearing the approaching vehicle before becoming aware, even more distantly, of its headlights turning towards her. She spun around in a panic, heard the screech of tyres, and the impact of the car as it sent her careening sideways. The world tilted, the falling sensation ending abruptly as her head hit the tarmac and true darkness enveloped her.

  *

  When light finally penetrated the black, she became aware of a softness enfolding her, almost as if she were suspended in it. But with the light came pain, a searing pain that spiked through her skull and violated her consciousness. She opened her eyes, startled, only to be blinded by the light in her bedroom.

  Beyond initial confusion, shapes took form around her. Silhouettes against the light. Faces crystallized into familiarity. Her mother, her father. Isabella. A man who it took her some moments to realize was their family physician, Doctor Celestino. A small and balding man with large, horn-rimmed glasses. They leaned into her field of vision and she could see concern on all their faces.

  The doctor’s voice came to her faintly. Her hands shot instinctively to her ears, but her hearing aids had been removed.

  ‘She’s lucky,’ Celestino was saying. ‘Some cuts and bruises, but nothing broken, I think. The driver said he had come to a virtual standstill before he hit her.’

  Then her father’s voice, tight with anger. ‘I can smell alcohol on her breath. She was out drinking with that boy!’

  Anger gave Ana the strength to pull herself up on to one elbow. ‘I am not drunk!’ she shouted, only convincing everyone in the room that she was. ‘I couldn’t see when I got off the bus. Everything was dark, like they’d turned out the lights.’ The effort of speaking exhausted her and she dropped once more on to her back. ‘I couldn’t even see the stars in the sky.’

  ‘So you were blind drunk!’ her father growled.

  ‘Papi!’ It was Isabella’s voice, trying to calm their father.

  Doctor Celestino leaned in close to peer into her eyes. ‘Has that ever happened to you before, mi niña?’ he asked.

  ‘I’ve never let her drink in this house.’ Her father was defensive now. ‘Not once.’

  But Celestino ignored him. ‘Ana,’ he said. ‘Has it?’

  Ana tried to bring clarity to her confusion. ‘No. Not like that. I never see well at night. Never have.’ She paused. ‘It’s like that for everyone, isn’t it?’ Then, ‘It’s as if I was blind. I just couldn’t see.’

  Ana’s mother’s voice now. ‘Is there something wrong with her, doctor?’

  But Celestino kept his focus on Ana. ‘Do you have trouble seeing things in your peripheral vision, little one?’

  Ana didn’t understand. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Bump into things or people on either side of you that you just don’t see. Trip over stuff on the ground.’

  Ana remembered what she had told Sergio only an hour before. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘All the time.’

 
Celestino turned towards Ana’s parents, his voice laden with concern. ‘I think maybe Ana should see a specialist.’

  *

  Resentment simmered in Ana’s house for the next ten days. Neither of her parents could forgive her, nor she them. She did not go back to the centre while she waited for her appointment with the ophthalmologist in Estepona. School had closed for the summer, and it had not been decided whether Ana would return for a repeat year or apply for a place at college. Her results were not yet in, and everything would depend on how good, or bad, they were.

  The days dragged and she wished there were some way she could contact Sergio to tell him what had happened. But she had no idea where he lived, or even his family name.

  Nights were worse. She had noticed, with an increasing sense of disquiet, that her night vision was deteriorating rapidly, and she did not even want to venture out of the house after dark

  She spent most of her time shut away in her room listening to music, or reading, or simply daydreaming. Anything to avoid facing the uncertainty of a doctor’s diagnosis and a future whose clarity was obscured by doubt.

  Her father took the day off work to drive them into Estepona for Ana’s appointment with Doctor Esteban at his private consulting rooms in the healthcare centre on the Avenida Juan Carlos Rey de España. Ana never thought to ask how much it might be costing, but her parents had been told that an appointment with a health service specialist could take weeks, even months, and so her father had decided to go private.

  She spent more than an hour with the doctor, undergoing tests for both sight and hearing. He asked her endless questions about her apparent clumsiness and invited her to perform various tasks that tested her spatial awareness. He took blood samples to be sent for analysis, performed standard eye tests, and took an electroretinogram to measure the response of her retinas to light stimuli.