me enough hints."
"Are you going to do whit e roses? Women love white roses."
" You love white roses."
"And I don't have a significant other, so I need to live vicariously through yours." She reached out, squeezing his shoulder. Her touch was one of the few that wouldn't receive a guarded look in return. "Seriously. I know you're not the mushy, touchy-feely type, but please… on behalf of every desperate single woman who's going to want to throw herself off a bridge in two days, do it right. It's important."
"I t's important," he echoed, as if in doing so he could reassure her of his depth of understanding. "Are you, by the way?"
"Am I what? ", she fixed her gloves as the train squealed to a slow stop at the platform.
"Going to throw yourself off a bridge?"
"If the winds are right."
Kai turned suddenly to the window, catching a surprised breath as he held in a sneeze.
"Bless you. You were sneezing this morning, too. I hope you're not catching a cold."
"Don't miss your stop."
Mary glanced quickly up the aisle, annoyed to find the line of egressing passengers already far ahead of her.
"Shoot. Have a good night, Kai – see you tomorrow?"
"Will do."
She later regretted telling him about Chance, but there was perhaps no better analogy to describe Kai.
They'd met three years earlier, classmates in an adult education class on American Sign Language. Every so often the teacher paired them together to rehearse the frustrating pantomime, and Mary marveled at how quickly and fluidly he picked it up.
"You should have been born mute," she accused, and he smiled, at least as much as he ever did. A 10:1 ratio of smirk to smile.
"I have a secret," he said. "My parents were both deaf. I could sign before I could talk."
She was surprised at his gentle, quiet candor, even then. Kai was not a man to whom confessions came easily or frequently.
"Then why are you here?"
He avoided her eyes, soaking in silence, then said, "I wanted to make friends."
Mary was the only friend he took away from the class, at least that she knew of. She admitted to an emptiness she'd also been hoping to fill, and eventually they skipped class, exchanging it for weekly meetings for coffee.
Kai was sweet, but one friend was enough for him. He was a research assistant for a pharmaceutical company in town, quiet and lonely work that suited his aversion to crowds. Shyness was a childhood affliction from which Mary herself had never fully recovered, and she was pleased to find that Kai's quiet company brought out her inner imp.
She could be playful with him, teasing and light and comical. She had no fear of reprisal, their conversations thoughtful without being heavy, intimate without being romantic. He had the look of a sensitive bard, but there was no poetry to his words; he spoke awkwardly, uncertainly, as if the sound of his own voice jarred him. Mary frequently called him on it.
"It might have something to do with how I was raised," he said.
"Because of your parents?"
"It wasn't just that. They ran a private school for the deaf. I was home-schooled most of my life, along with my parents' students, so I didn't have much… verbal interaction, I guess you'd say."
"None of them spoke to you?"
"It wasn't that some of them couldn't , but… imagine learning fluent Spanish, then going to Spain. The locals might recognize you as an American, they might have a rudimentary grasp of your language, but if they don't have to bother speaking English, they won't."
"But you could still talk to them. Sign to them, I mean."
He grew quiet, a not-infrequent bridge of introspection. He'd lived so long in a world of silence, the concept of thinking out loud was alien, and Mary had to adjust to these quiet periods between them, letting him work out his backlog of thoughts.
"Signing isn't… exactly the same. You do it quickly, stream of consciousness. You cut small things out, words
"Are you going to do whit e roses? Women love white roses."
" You love white roses."
"And I don't have a significant other, so I need to live vicariously through yours." She reached out, squeezing his shoulder. Her touch was one of the few that wouldn't receive a guarded look in return. "Seriously. I know you're not the mushy, touchy-feely type, but please… on behalf of every desperate single woman who's going to want to throw herself off a bridge in two days, do it right. It's important."
"I t's important," he echoed, as if in doing so he could reassure her of his depth of understanding. "Are you, by the way?"
"Am I what? ", she fixed her gloves as the train squealed to a slow stop at the platform.
"Going to throw yourself off a bridge?"
"If the winds are right."
Kai turned suddenly to the window, catching a surprised breath as he held in a sneeze.
"Bless you. You were sneezing this morning, too. I hope you're not catching a cold."
"Don't miss your stop."
Mary glanced quickly up the aisle, annoyed to find the line of egressing passengers already far ahead of her.
"Shoot. Have a good night, Kai – see you tomorrow?"
"Will do."
She later regretted telling him about Chance, but there was perhaps no better analogy to describe Kai.
They'd met three years earlier, classmates in an adult education class on American Sign Language. Every so often the teacher paired them together to rehearse the frustrating pantomime, and Mary marveled at how quickly and fluidly he picked it up.
"You should have been born mute," she accused, and he smiled, at least as much as he ever did. A 10:1 ratio of smirk to smile.
"I have a secret," he said. "My parents were both deaf. I could sign before I could talk."
She was surprised at his gentle, quiet candor, even then. Kai was not a man to whom confessions came easily or frequently.
"Then why are you here?"
He avoided her eyes, soaking in silence, then said, "I wanted to make friends."
Mary was the only friend he took away from the class, at least that she knew of. She admitted to an emptiness she'd also been hoping to fill, and eventually they skipped class, exchanging it for weekly meetings for coffee.
Kai was sweet, but one friend was enough for him. He was a research assistant for a pharmaceutical company in town, quiet and lonely work that suited his aversion to crowds. Shyness was a childhood affliction from which Mary herself had never fully recovered, and she was pleased to find that Kai's quiet company brought out her inner imp.
She could be playful with him, teasing and light and comical. She had no fear of reprisal, their conversations thoughtful without being heavy, intimate without being romantic. He had the look of a sensitive bard, but there was no poetry to his words; he spoke awkwardly, uncertainly, as if the sound of his own voice jarred him. Mary frequently called him on it.
"It might have something to do with how I was raised," he said.
"Because of your parents?"
"It wasn't just that. They ran a private school for the deaf. I was home-schooled most of my life, along with my parents' students, so I didn't have much… verbal interaction, I guess you'd say."
"None of them spoke to you?"
"It wasn't that some of them couldn't , but… imagine learning fluent Spanish, then going to Spain. The locals might recognize you as an American, they might have a rudimentary grasp of your language, but if they don't have to bother speaking English, they won't."
"But you could still talk to them. Sign to them, I mean."
He grew quiet, a not-infrequent bridge of introspection. He'd lived so long in a world of silence, the concept of thinking out loud was alien, and Mary had to adjust to these quiet periods between them, letting him work out his backlog of thoughts.
"Signing isn't… exactly the same. You do it quickly, stream of consciousness. You cut small things out, words
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