Nathan and Josslyn stood on the front porch one morning; he with a mug of decaffeinated coffee, and she with a cup of Earl Grey tea and honey. Josslyn had placed a plate of bagels with cream cheese and lox on an outdoor table.
Trina soon joined them and set a plate of breakfast muffins next to the bagels. “I’m going to fix myself some hot cocoa,” she signed. “Caden said he’d be out shortly.”
“Okay,” Josslyn signed and sipped some tea.
Nathan chewed on a bagel and sipped some coffee.
They observed the neighbors walk by, smiled and waved “hello” and “good morning” to a few of them, but none of them looked their way.
Josslyn elbowed Nathan with a knowing smile. “You were a naughty boy last night, weren’t you?”
“Who, me?” Nathan signed. “Naughty? What do you mean?”
“Oh, come on. You know.” Josslyn suppressed a giggle and winked once at him.
“I do? Sorry, I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“You had your hands all over me last night. You really got me going pretty good.”
“Really? If I did, I would’ve remembered. Otherwise, I was dead asleep.”
“You don’t remember?”
Nathan shook his head. “Not at all. As I just said, I would’ve remembered having done that.”
“Wow! Maybe I was dreaming, but I doubt it. It seemed—and felt—pretty real.”
“Did you wake up or open your eyes to see if I was touching you?”
“Well, I was in that place between awake and asleep, but I didn’t open my eyes or turn over to face you. I just lay there, enjoying your loving touch and caress.”
“For the life of me, I have no recollection of doing anything to you last night.”
“It’s not like you to forget something like that.”
“Yeah, I know.”
“How strange.”
Trina came out with her mug of hot cocoa and waved with a smile to a passerby, but that person walked on without a glance toward the Bryants.
“Wonder why they’re ignoring us?” Trina signed.
It dawned on Josslyn that the people weren’t walking in front of their house along their side of the street. In fact, they walked up to a neighbor’s house located on either side of their own house, then crossed the street to the other side, and walked over two or three houses down in either direction, then crossed back over to the same side and continued on. It seemed as if they avoided the Bryants’ house on purpose. This perplexed Josslyn and she found this disconcerting. It’s sort of like a scene right out of a Twilight Zone episode, she thought.
“Maybe they’re not ignoring us,” Josslyn signed to Trina. “Maybe they’re just wary since we are new to the neighborhood and we are deaf, so they don’t know us yet. Being strangers can be somewhat unnerving to some people. When a person has a certain type of disability, it can be even more unnerving and unsettling to others. We’ll just have to be optimistic and give them some time to warm up to us and get to know us. Before we know it, not only will they be our neighbors, but some of them will be our new friends.”
Trina sipped her cocoa and mulled over her mother’s words.