Summer's Glory: Seasons of Faith Book One (Arcadia Valley Romance 2)
Page 18
He smiled and kissed her forehead before releasing her and tucking his hands in his pockets. With Ruth it was never an issue to talk without signing. Even if he didn’t know what he sounded like. Half the time he imagined it was still the voice he remembered from his childhood, but it had to have changed as he’d grown up. Maybe, if he was lucky, he sounded a little bit like Dad. At least in his mind, Dad’s baritone had been warm. Friendly. “Do you need me to go tonight?”
“No. No, I don’t need you there for me. I just think you might find something there for you.”
He scoffed but didn’t ask exactly what she had in mind. As a recently engaged woman, Ruth was probably scouting the single ladies with an eye toward her brothers. But he’d been in high school when he’d given up on the delusion that he’d ever marry. The few deaf girls he’d dated had wanted him to turn his back on his hearing friends. And the hearing girls had treated him like he was a project. No. He was better off imagining love with someone like Scarlet Fire online than trying to navigate the real thing.
Malachi clicked on the mission, double checked that he had all the required equipment on board, and opened the map. He chose the first star system he’d need to visit and set the ship in motion. It wasn’t instantaneous transport, which made the game a little more fun. Things could go wrong en route. There were pirates for one, and the handful of people who were irked at him for beating them to prizes. Most of them got over it and remembered it was just a game. But there were others who needed a stiff dose of reality. He tried to steer clear.
“Started without me?” Scarlet Fire’s chat message popped up.
“Just barely. You can still join if you want.”
“Sound good. I’ll beam in?”
“Perfect.” Malachi closed out of the armor customizing screen he’d been in and ran through the halls of his ship to the transportation hub. He verified that it was her and clicked to allow her to join the party. Her avatar materialized. He swallowed. It wasn’t as if he didn’t run into roughly the same avatar all the time—you could only customize your clothes and hair—but something about hers always made his heart stop. Which probably meant he needed to get a real life. “Welcome. We’ll hit the first system in about two minutes. How was your day?”
“Got a new client. Always a good day. Even better, they’re a referral from a previous client and they’re local.”
“Don’t you do web design? Why does local matter?”
“Doesn’t necessarily. But sometimes it helps if there are hiccups.” Her avatar’s hair color changed from bright red to blonde. “What do you think?”
“It’s different.”
“Is that good or bad? Was trying to go a little more real to life.” The hair changed back. “Maybe that’s not a good thing?”
She was a blonde. It didn’t fit his mental image. Not surprising as he’d essentially un-animated her avatar and dressed her in normal clothes when he was forming it. But...blonde worked, too. “No, I liked it. It just took me by surprise.”
“Don’t you ever want people to know the real you?”
He shook his head and tapped the keys to dock the star ship at the port where they’d find the first leg of their mission. The best part of online multi-player games was having the chance to be who he really was without first waiting for people to get over the fact that he was deaf. “Not really.”
©2017 by Elizabeth R.R. Maddrey
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Published in the United States of America by Elizabeth Maddrey
www.ElizabethMaddrey.com
Publisher’s Note: This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. All characters are fictional, and any similarity to people living or dead is purely coincidental.