Silent Phone Calls (KuroKen)

-37-

Kenma's POV

"We've been making some very good progress lately Kozume!" It's been a little more than one week, three session to be exact, since Suzuki brought up my mother. Since then she hasn't really brought her up again, now we're focusing more on speech therapy. She said I was making good progress even though I felt like I wasn't moving forward at all. Sure I was making sounds but each time those words tried to form into sentence it's like I could feel my mother strangling me again. "I want you to try again, what sound does this letter make?"

"..." I gulped and tried to pronounce the letter on the flash card in front of me.

"That's alright take your time." Each time I tried to speak I could see her, standing in front of me. "Why don't you try closing your eyes." I did as instructed and it did help a bit, I didn't see my mother but that didn't stop the feeling of being strangled.

"...a..." It was barely above a whisper but I still made a sound, and Suzuki seemed extremely happy about that.

"Perfect!" She smiled widely at me and flicked over to the next card. She was treating me like a preschooler learning basic reading, but I suppose I sort of was a preschooler in this sense. Even less than that really, preschoolers can talk. She held up the next card, "What about this letter?" I closed by eyes again and took a deep breath.

"...b" Sometimes I can't even tell if I said anything or not, it's so quiet. If it wasn't for the burning in my throat I wouldn't have known a sound ever left my mouth.

Therapy today dragged on but eventually I made it through the whole alphabet and was allowed to leave. It's been like this for the past two sessions. We'd talk a bit about how things were going, she'd ask about Kuroo and his family, and then we'd go to the flash cards. This was the first time I was able to get through all of them.

"Hey how was it today?" My appointment got moved to a later time since it conflicted with Aoi-san's work, this allowed Kuroo to pick me up after each appointment. I enjoyed seeing him after these taxing sessions.

'It went ok I think.' Even though I felt like I made zero progress Suzuki and Aoi-san always acted like it was a big deal.

"Mom said you got through half of the flash cards on Tuesday, what about today?" He asked as we made our way to the car.

'I did them all.' He immediately stopped and a huge grin spread across his face. Kuroo threw his arms around me and hugged me, picking me up as well. He was hugging me so tightly I felt like I couldn't breath, but I enjoyed his hugs so I didn't say anything.

"Kenma that's so cool! I'm so proud!" He plopped me back down gently and grabbed my hand pulling me towards the car. Whenever we got in the car he always left me a second to say anything before we leave, once we hit the road he couldn't really watch he sign. I always used this time to say whatever was bothering me most but since this therapy session was pretty calm I just settled for something calm as well.

'Thanks for picking me up.'

"Today we're gonna start with some words and then move onto our talks afterwards," I began to dread Tuesday and Thursday specifically from 2:30 to 3:30. "Does that sound ok?" I nodded my head and she pulled out a different set of flash cards. "Can you repeat the word on this card?" I looked at the card, Kenma. Why does she want me to say my own name? I guess I gotta start somewhere although I'd much rather learn to say anyone else's name but whatever I guess.

"..k..e" I struggled to get the letters out of my mouth let alone connect them.

"Lets take it piece by piece." She turned to flash card back around, quickly wrote something, and then turned it back towards me. Ke-n-ma. She split my name up so I could take it a bit more slowly. "Try this."