Hearing his Heart Beat

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I knew I loved you when I started making excuses for the way you hurt me. - Anonymous
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I woke up in silence. I open my eyes and find that I'm in a hospital room. These machines are really quite. I look at how many complex machines are hooked up to me. I'm sore, specifically in my ribs. I cough and wince, but I make no sound. Odd.
Soon a nurse comes in and smiles at me before yelling something to someone outside of the room. Except....she didn't make any noise.
This is just weird.
A doctor came in and gave a warm smile, before handing me a piece of paper.
It was a report of some sort.
Shanna Hope Woods, 18, African American, female, hit by a motor vehicle, two broken ribs, temporary to permanent deafness in both ears.

What? I look up at the doctor with tears in my eyes and he gave me a remorseful look before going over to a white board in the room and explaining that my ribs took the impact and when I landed my head took the fall and that I'd been unconscious for two weeks and while I was they did a cat scan on my brain and that deafness was the result of my fall. He wrote that my deafness was caused by the trauma of the fall so there's no saying what if anything could undo it. He continued to write that I was pretty lucky since most people with mild car hits end up with skull fractures, serious speech impediment and even mental illness and possible death. He sent my mom in when he was done.

My mom adopted me when I was two, and never cared once when people asked about our different races. I was her daughter and she was my mom.
She didn't say anything, she just crawled in my bed and pulled me close to her as I cried. And boy did I cry and I screamed, but it didn't matter cause I couldn't hear it and I threw stuff and even resulted in hitting myself upside the head trying to get whatever was jacked up in there to go back to normal.

After a while my mom got up and went over to the white board.

"My daughter is smart and beautiful and kind and she likes old movies and really thought out love stories and she is the most amazing dancer and writer and she is so loving and she's great with people, especially kids and she doesn't need to hear to be all of those wonderful things. She doesn't need to hear to be Shanna." She wrote

And I sigh as there was obviously a knock at the door, because my mom suddenly turned to it and her lips moved.

And in walked the devil himself. David Noble. My moms face turned from it's usual loving nature to murder in a matter of seconds. They started arguing and before long David turned to me looking annoyed, not remorseful or sad, annoyed and over mouthed the words "I'm sorry," before leaving. I didn't hear from him again while I was in the hospital.

Over the next few days I got released from the hospital. They prepped me with the safety precautions and accommodations that I'd have to make for my new life. I'm now learning ASL six days a week. My mom had to have someone install a high tech security system that flashed bright, different color lights. Red for fire alarms, white for intruder warnings, blue for dangerous weather, etc. I had to take a special class and get my licensed renewed if I wanted to drive. I was going to lose my dance scholarship. Everything I did was dangerous now. My whole life seemed to change.
My school had this program for deaf kids that I didn't know about until now. Basically I'd be able to return to school once I was pretty decent at ASL and they'd pay this hearing student who was fluent in ASL, to basically become my babysitter and translate for me all day.

It took me four weeks of 8 hour ASL classes to reach the needed knowledge level for returning to school.

I nervously walk into this building that felt foreign even though it's been my place of education for the past four years.

Our receptionist smiles at me, obviously expecting me and says something and I thought everyone, the doctor, David, My mom, the school, was playing a huge joke on me when James Young approached me, signing 'hello'.