by Mary Carter
When she got into arguments with hearing people about this, they either thought she was delusional or a bigot. She wasn’t either. She didn’t think she was better than hearing people, simply equal. She didn’t want more rights than they had, she wanted the same. She didn’t want to change the way they led their lives, she just wanted to be left alone to live hers. It was draining to constantly be looked at as deficient, handicapped, in need of fixing. Other people’s opinions—that was the handicap she faced, not her hearing loss!
The view that she was “less than” because she used a different language to communicate. The view that she could only do certain things, be certain things, have certain things. The biggest barriers she faced were man-made, not physical. The ceiling was not only glass, it was soundproof as well. Assumptions were the root of all evil. Limitations slapped on her by people who “meant well.” Immediately her intelligence and abilities “capped” because of someone else’s ignorance. Hearing people just couldn’t seem to grasp it. And maybe she couldn’t expect them to understand the nuances and beauty of a culture they’d never experienced, see that she was just as passionate about watching a skilled ASL-user paint a story before her eyes as hearing people were about listening to a symphony, but couldn’t they at least comprehend that Driving While Deaf was not against the law? Couldn’t she just get through one day without someone saying something incredibly condescending? Apparently not, if Sheila Sherman was around. Next week she was going to have to paint whiskers and claws on her, and she didn’t mean Fran. She watched Sheila take in the driver’s license.
“Oh,” Sheila said. “Oh no.” Sheila ran to the window and opened the shade. Lacey followed. A tow truck was backed up in front of her Sportster. The driver was lowering his cab. Sheila just stood there. Lacey yanked the window open, pushed Sheila out of the way, and screamed bloody murder.
Chapter 3
Lacey pushed the Harley past eighty, as if trying to outrun the tow truck. He was nowhere to be seen, probably still reeling from the Tasmanian devil who threw herself out the window, mounted her bike, and sped away before the ramp from his evil little truck even grazed the ground. Next item on the agenda: Snag an interpreter for the book reading. Alan was a possibility, but she wasn’t ready to tell him about this, not yet; there wasn’t anything to tell. A good story needed an ending, and this one was still dangling over the volcano. Besides, Alan wasn’t prone to temper like Lacey, and there was a slight chance he wouldn’t approve of her plans to ambush the impostor at her own book reading.
Professional interpreters were supposed to be neutral; they couldn’t interject their own opinions or talk about the assignment to anyone else. If Monica Bowman was the lying face thief she appeared to be, Lacey didn’t want Alan witnessing the scene Lacey was going to make. Was there any way she could get through it without an interpreter?
Not in a large crowd with a person speaking from a podium. When Lacey talked with a hearing person one-on-one, there were a gazillion tools she could employ to communicate. She was always willing to write back and forth with hearing people as well as use gestures. And although Lacey could use her voice and be understood, she preferred not to. It brought back too many memories of excruciating speech lessons, staring into a mirror or clutching a balloon to feel the vibrations of her words. Feel my throat, bah, bah, bah, mah, mah, mah, dah, dah, dah, ha, ha, ha. Don’t squeeze the balloon. You’re squeezing. Gentle hands. Gentle hands. Feel my throat. Gentle hands on my throat. Pah, pah, pah. Good girl. Good speech. Back to the balloon. No! That hurts my ears. If you pop one more—
Sometimes, Lacey would leave the lessons in tears; other times she’d float out feeling like the Queen of the Hearing World. She would believe the speech therapist. What a wonderful voice she had. How clearly she spoke. It was magic. Sounds reverberating in her chest and throat, lips moving to push out the words, the key to the hearing empire at the tip of her tongue. But when Lacey tried out her “good girl” speech with strangers, and waitresses at restaurants, they didn’t understand her. Instead of a “good girl” pat on the back or a yellow smiley-face sticker, she got blank stares, scrunched-up faces of incomprehension, and disgusting sticky white rice instead of the French fries she’d tried to order.
Funny, she could understand what they said to each other after she tried to speak. What did she say? I didn’t understand her, did you? She’s deaf and dumb. And when they did understand her, it was even worse. They would make a humiliating fuss as if she should be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for enunciating “I want milk.” Lacey had an urge to bark like a dog whenever anyone told her she “spoke well.” Well, guess what. She signed well too, she had absolutely beautiful ASL, her classifiers were flawless. American Sign Language was her language, her birthright, not some subpar substitute for English.
But tonight wasn’t about her identity as a Deaf woman, it was about identity period. This wasn’t about expelling myths about Deaf people, this was confronting a face thief. And for that, she was going to need an interpreter. Unfortunately, she knew just who she was going to have to ask.
Kelly Thayler came to Hillcrest when she was thirteen, after a car accident that took her parents and her left leg. Her parents were killed on impact but her left leg lingered until the doctors had no choice but to amputate. Kelly had been at Hillcrest only three years when an aunt who was a tango dancer in Argentina swooped back to the States and took Kelly to California with her. But until then, Kelly stuck to Lacey like glue. All it took was Lacey teaching her the signs for “bitch,” “cookie,” and “lesbian” (all used to talk about Margaret Harris, their house mother, behind her back) for Kelly to be hooked on the secret finger talk.
In addition to her wheelchair, Kelly had a metal prosthetic leg that had a funny way of disappearing in the middle of the night and showing up in the oddest places, like in the center of the dining room table on Thanksgiving with dandelions and wish flowers from the backyard sticking out the top like a Frankenstein vase. Lacey told her she should blow out the wish flower and wish her leg would stop disappearing.
But no matter what Lacey did to Kelly, Kelly loved her. And apparently, it was the kind of love that never wore off. A few years ago, Kelly looked Lacey up and e-mailed her. When Lacey didn’t respond, Kelly started an all-out campaign. She sent Lacey recipes, pictures, jokes, chain letters, e-cards, and umpteen album links with pictures of a smiling Kelly in different settings with the same purple turtleneck, until Lacey finally relented and e-mailed her back.
Kelly had Googled and Facebooked everything she could on Lacey, and was quick to congratulate her on all the parts of her life she had missed out on: graduating with a Master’s in fine arts, learning to ride a motorcycle, skydiving, and establishing herself as a Deaf artist. Kelly raved about how beautiful Lacey still was, and how lucky they were to live in an era where technology could help disabled people like them. Kelly proudly announced she had a cutting-edge prosthetic leg that allowed her to run her first 5k and chase after her children. Then Kelly dropped one final bomb, the one she’d probably been waiting to drop all along, that she’d grown up to become a certified sign language interpreter and that she too was living just outside Philly. If Lacey wanted an interpreter at this late notice, and didn’t want to pay, it looked like she was going to have to pay a visit to her stalker.
“Can you interpret for me tonight? Book signing.” They were sitting in Kelly’s crowded living room on a flowered couch. Lacey and a Tickle Me Elmo were sitting at one end, Kelly on the other, and sandwiched in between them was a four-year-old Korean girl who giggled every time either of them signed.
“I’d love to,” Kelly said. “But I won’t be able to get a sitter this late, so I’ll just have to bring the kids.” Becoming an interpreter and getting a fancy new leg weren’t the only things Kelly Thayler had been up to since she escaped Hillcrest; she’d also been busy adopting children. She had six, all plucked from orphanages. The other five were playing in the backyard, just behind the living r
oom. From her vantage point on the couch, Kelly could watch them while she conversed with Lacey.
“You’re so lucky you’re deaf,” she said. “They’re loud.” The little girl nodded in agreement and covered her ears with her hands. Lacey glanced at the living room floor, littered with toys. Kelly seemed completely comfortable with chaos.
“Can your husband watch the kids?” Lacey asked. A smile appeared on Kelly’s face, along with the look of someone who had a juicy secret.
“My wife is out of town,” she said, still smiling. “She’s in New York until the weekend.” Lacey nodded, determined not to show the shock Kelly had clearly been anticipating, even relishing.
“Thanks anyway,” Lacey said. Kelly looked crestfallen; she obviously wanted Lacey to grill her about her wife.
“They’ll be fine,” Kelly said. “They love books.”
“No,” Lacey said. “This isn’t a kid’s book.”
“Benjamin Books has a great play area. They’ll love it.” Six children bouncing off walls while Lacey tried to confront Monica Bowman? No way.
“Sorry. It’s not going to work.”
“Why not?”
“I have to go.” Lacey was about to stand when Kelly thrust her index finger forward and shook it at Lacey.
“You’re hiding something,” she said.
“I am not,” Lacey said.
“You are too. You did the thing.”
“What thing?”
“You touched your nose.” The little girl on the couch saw Kelly touching her nose, giggled, and touched her own nose. She looked at Lacey. Lacey didn’t comply.
“So what?” Lacey said.
“You did that as a kid too. Every time you pulled one of your stunts and Margaret was grilling you, you’d touch your nose.”
“I did not.”
“How do you think she always knew when you were lying?” A dozen punishments flashed through Lacey’s mind. There was a time Lacey believed Margaret when she said she had eyes in the back of her head. She’d lie awake nights imagining those eyeballs burrowed underneath Margaret’s mass of tangled salt-and-pepper hair. Truly terrifying.
“Why didn’t you ever tell me?”
“I had to have some power, didn’t I? The way you used me.”
“Used you?”
“The things you used to make me do!”
“You could’ve said no.”
“You always said you wouldn’t be my friend if I didn’t.”
“Are you crying? That was a million years ago.”
“Nothing’s changed,” Kelly said. “You’re still trying to rope me into doing things without telling me what you’re doing.”
“I asked you to interpret. Not rob a bank.”
“I became an interpreter because of you.”
“Then you should be thanking me. It’s a nice-paying job.”
“It’s not about the money.” Kelly crossed her good leg over the bad and took a deep breath. “I wrote you so many letters,” she said. Little pink and blue envelopes with postmarks from California floated through Lacey’s memory. The little girl on the couch, whose name Lacey was ashamed she couldn’t remember, snuck a tiny hand over to her mother and patted her knee. She didn’t know what her mother and Lacey were saying, but she knew her mother was on the verge of tears. Lacey felt like the biggest loser on the planet.
“I know,” Lacey said. “I’m sorry.”
“Why didn’t you write me back?”
“I didn’t even open them,” Lacey said.
“What?” Kelly asked. Lacey sprang off the couch and maneuvered around the toys until she reached the window. She sat on the sill.
“You got to leave,” Lacey said. “You moved to a sunny place with a beach. You had a family. A cool aunt who traveled, and danced, and didn’t hide liquor bottles under the couch cushions and put salt in the cookies.” Kelly stood up. Lacey wanted to tell her she was happy she had a new leg. In the past, standing up would have required a ton of effort and clunky movements. With this new leg, Kelly could stand gracefully. Lacey wished she had it in her to be nicer. But just seeing Kelly was bringing back memories of Hillcrest, and Margaret; it was almost as if just thinking about those days would bring them back. As if Lacey could blink, and she’d be a child again, back in her room, her bunk, making puppet shadows on the wall and plotting an escape that didn’t come quick enough.
“I missed you,” Kelly said. “I hated California. I only wanted you. You were like a sister to me.”
—You have a twin sister. Her name is Monica—
“I have to go,” Lacey said.
“Didn’t you miss me?” Kelly pleaded. She looked like a child herself, lost and needy. Lacey didn’t want to hurt Kelly’s feelings, but she also had to be honest.
“No,” she said. It was true, and it wasn’t. She had missed Kelly at first. But she also hated her for having a beach, and a cool aunt. Lacey knew deep down there was something wrong with her; she didn’t have whatever it took inside to attach to other people. Whenever she got too close, she’d go on lockdown. Probably a childish reaction on her part as well, but one she didn’t know how to undo. The only reason she and Alan had been together for six years was that he didn’t put any demands on her. Had he wanted a traditional life, a traditional wife instead of a live-in girl who wanted to take things a day at a time, she knew they never would have made it this far.
“I never forgot you,” Kelly said.
“I’m sorry,” Lacey said. “But I had to forget you. You weren’t coming back. I went on with my life.”
“So you didn’t think of me as a sister?” Lacey didn’t know what to say. The answer was no.
“That’s a great leg,” Lacey said instead. Kelly just looked at Lacey and for a second all movement in the room ceased. Even the shadows on the wall sat still. “No,” Lacey said. “I didn’t think of you like a sister.”
“I see,” Kelly said. She started tidying up, plucking toys off the floor and tossing them into a large tub in the corner of the room. “Blunt as usual, aren’t you?” Kelly added. She continued to swipe at the toys with the proficiency of one who did it twelve times a day. The child scurried over to the tub of toys and picked up each one that was tossed in, examining it as if she’d never seen it before in her life, before throwing it back herself. The child, Lacey noticed, didn’t gently toss the toy like her mother; instead she slammed it into the tub, then peered in after it to see if it had survived, before waiting for the next one to maul.
“I didn’t think of anyone as family,” Lacey said. “Not you. Not Margaret, not one of the other dozens of kids I lived with. We were just animals in a zoo.”
“My God,” Kelly said. Just then the screen door opened and five other children piled in, three boys and two girls. Leaving the door wide open behind them, they ran through the room to the adjacent kitchen, opened the door to the basement, and disappeared down the steps. Lacey wanted to laugh—it was like a herd of bulls had just stampeded through—but Kelly didn’t look as if she could take a joke. Kelly walked over and shut the sliding glass doors.
“They’re my life,” she said, staring at the basement door.
“Better you than me,” Lacey said.
“Lacey the lone wolf,” Kelly said.
“I have to go,” Lacey said.
“What about Alan?” Kelly asked. “Do you consider him family?”
“He’s my boyfriend.”
“That doesn’t answer my question.”
“I have to go.”
“I’ll see you at seven.” Kelly said as she walked Lacey to the front door.
“No,” Lacey said. “I’ll find another interpreter.”
“Why don’t you just tell me what’s going on? Why don’t you let me in?” Lacey hated the look on Kelly’s face. She was letting her down, disappointing her. But she couldn’t give her what she wanted. Kelly did get to leave. She did get a beach and a cool aunt. She didn’t have to smell Margaret’s morning breath or get used to
new kids every year, or put up with a dozen new staff members who wanted to be “friends” only to skip out the first chance they got. The truth was, Lacey cried for a week straight after Kelly left. Not because she missed her, but because she was left behind. Lacey would’ve given up one of her good legs to go to California with Kelly. Then maybe she would’ve loved her like a sister. There was no use going into old history now.
“I know you’re up to something,” Kelly said. “And you know I’ll find out, so you might as well just tell me.”
“Interpreters are supposed to be neutral,” Lacey said. “Not stick their nose in where it doesn’t belong.” The little girl ran over to Kelly, wrapped her arms around Kelly’s leg—Lacey couldn’t remember if it was the good or the bad—and smothered it in kisses. Kelly ruffled her hair.
“You don’t know what you’re missing,” Kelly said. “Family is everything. Without them I’d be nothing.”
Without them, I’d be nothing. Who was Kelly kidding? She’d be a one-legged pain in the ass, just like she was now. So much for being a professional interpreter. Lacey hadn’t meant to hurt her feelings, but it had to be done. There was no way Lacey would be able to keep this sister-impostor secret if Kelly got wind of it. Now she had only three hours until her anniversary dinner, and she still didn’t even have a present for Alan. Maybe she would paint him something. That was it. She could whip something out in an hour, something abstract. She should have thought of it before; Alan loved everything she painted. It was one of the things she loved about him.
She would go home, grab clothes to change into for dinner, go to the studio, paint like a madwoman, then change into dinner clothes, go straight to Benjamin Books, then race to dinner. She was working up a sweat just thinking about it.