Your voice feels beautiful ~TodoBaku~

Chapter 19: another systematic nightmare

After that, it was a blur until I found myself sat in Dr Yosano's room, awaiting her. Bakugo knelt beside my chair, holding my hand and squeezing it, sending me reassurance constantly. He suddenly stood up, backing into his seat, and Dr Yosano stepped into view. She was a tall lady, and always seemed to be wearing a short black skirt, her murky purple bangs occasionally drifting into her eye-line. She, of course, knew how to sign, and after I saw her asking Bakugo a few questions, she turned to me, wanting to discuss her findings. Mum was going to relay everything that was said to Bakugo, that was apparently discussed in the car.

"Good news for you, Mr Todoroki. We've been closely analysing your most recent X-ray, and...well, we've found out that there's been a bit of a mistake."

"A mistake? You did say this was good news, right?" I relied, emphasising my lack of confidence with the accentuation of the word.

"Yes...you see, in our first X-ray, the one we've been basing our research on...the system has been found to be outdated, and had an abnormally high mistake rate when compared to newer technology"

"So you're saying that...my first X-ray was wrong?"

"Yes. That means...the information we had about your hearing being beyond repair is not accurate. We can fit you with hearing aids...well, right now, if you want."

"..."

Can you blame me, not responding? That's not exactly something that could be easily described, the thought of walking in to a clinic as a deaf man, and walking out as a 'normal' one. I looked over at my mother, who looked stunned as well, and to Bakugo, who was similarly in shock. Looking back at the now smiling Doctor, I simply nodded my head, and she walked out of the room, leaving me free to take it all in. Mum was crying by now, Bakugo hesitantly comforting her like the sweetheart he'd proven to be. I can't wait to here his voice, to be dissatisfied with only vibration.

He remained in his chair, comforting mum as she tried to compose herself, holding his hands up as she presumably apologised for the mess she was in. There'd be no more "presumably" soon, huh? Weird to think about, and absolutely terrifying, but it wasn't an offer I was going to then down, not in a million years.

Dr Yosano came back into the room, and held in her hand two small, white devices which I assumed were cochlea implants. If I wasn't so excited, I'd probably be pissed that this couldn't have happened years ago, but that had been erased from my mind at this point.

"Now, Shoto...I won't lie to you, this is going to be overwhelming. As soon as I attach the implants, I will leave the room and let you and your family have some alone time to help you adjust a little bit. For a short while after the implants are fitted, you will hear a very loud noise, which is completely normal, but I know you've got no idea what that will be like. I know that you are incredibly smart, and incredibly rational, so I know you can adapt to this...but it will be unpleasant. Good luck."

"...thank you" was all I signed to her, not sure quite what else to say. She stood behind my back, working to slide in both implants simultaneously. I shuddered at the slightly uncomfortable feeling at both sides of my head, before the most horrible thing I had ever experienced happened. It was so...so loud!

All I could...hear for the next minute and a half was the shrill wail, making my head ache like I'd been clocked on the head by a boxer. Eventually, the awful noise began to subside, and I let out a slow exhale, which startled me even further. What the HELL was that?! The revelation that you can hear yourself breathing was just one of many I would come to in that next minute, and I got plenty chance to make sure I was right, my breathing quickening as I started to panic. I stood up sharply, my chair shifting away as I did. The horrific grating sound it made as it scraped the floor nearly had me jumping out of my skin, and I found myself collapsing to the floor, crawling nimbly into the corner and curling myself up. I could feel tears welling up, and felt a guttural noise beginning to build in me.

I couldn't hold back from crying, and was frightened even more by the choked noise that came out of my mouth as I did, curling even further into my ball. The worst noise by far was the ticking, the scarily loud rhythmic chime that I couldn't identify to any object in the room. I know what all of these things are, WHY does one of them make that noise?!

I heard another slight chair scrape, and glanced up to see my mother approaching me slightly, carefully so as not to spook me. Bakugo hung back, knowing that my mother wanted to be first, which made me both love him and hate him more. Because while it was adorable that he knew my mother had priority, I wanted him. Still though, I didn't push her away when she wrapped her arms around me on the floor, letting me cry with that awful noise into her shoulder. She didn't speak, just adjusted our position so that she was looking right at me, wiping my soaked cheeks with a comforting smile. It was then that I saw her slightly open her mouth, and almost flinched as the words came.

"Don't cry. It's ok, I'm here"

Her voice was a lot different than I'd imagined voices would be. I expected there to be a rough edge to them, as if words were spat out all the time, but hers was soft, smooth like butter. It still alarmed me, the idea that I could now hear these people talk, and that infuriating ticking still continued, but there was comfort in her tone, and her smile helped calm me down a lot.

Bakugo slowly stood up, and my eyes flicked over to the sound his shoes made as he walked, twitching to them every time they...I don't even know, clopped (?) against the floor of the consulting room. He noticed, and stopped, sliding his feet out of the shoes and just walking over in his socks. I was pleased to learn that socks didn't make noise, and my mother climbed to her feet as he approached, offering him a sweet smile as he took her place with me, sitting next to me on the cold floor. He just sat there for a while, letting me hold him, before he stroked the side of my cheek, playfully poking me with his thumb. I giggled, then gasped at the weird sound that came out of my mouth, staring incredulously at him.

He fought back a grin, before pulling me into one of the warmest hugs I'd ever had, softly kissing my neck once as he did. The sound of his lips popping off my skin was the first pleasant noise I'd heard besides my mother's voice, and that was about to be majorly usurped as I saw Bakugo open his own mouth, nervous yet confident enough to speak to me. Properly.

"It's ok...I'm here, and I'm going nowhere"
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🥲

I'm not crying, you are!

This is one of my favourite chapters I've ever written. I really wanted to emphasise how much of a big deal every little thing is, and I hope I've done it justice.

Also it's a suuuuuper long, deluxe chapter!

Been a while since I broke 2K words....remind me to write longer chapters please 👀

Fact of the Day: the lyric mentioned in the last chapter's title along with this one is from Obey by BMTH ft YUNGBLUD.

(Also, aside from everything in this sentence, the exact word count for this chapter is 2021. Spooky, right?!)