Behind every story…

Many years ago, I taught a child who was deaf. No one knew he was deaf, not even his parents, so we all acted as though he could hear.

If you’ve ever put your fingers in your ears and tried to have a conversation with someone, that’s what it’s like to be deaf. If they’re close to you and speak loudly, you can hear in a muffled away, as if you’re underwater or on the other side of the room. If they’re further away and speak normally, you have no chance.

Lipreading’s an option although if you’re short-sighted, that’s a problem too. He was.

I was a young teacher, hanging on by the skin of my teeth. It was a hard job even in those days, before the National Curriculum, SATs, league tables and the unique terror of OFSTED. The child seemed disobedient, distracted, defiant. As well, he was always chatting to the boy next to him. I made my feelings clear.

He spent a lot of time catching up at playtime. When I sat with him, the statutory cup of (unlidded) coffee at my side, he seemed to listen and do good work. He was clearly bright. Why did he mess around?

After a while, I asked the Special Needs Teacher, who gave 1:1 time to those we were worried about, to take a look at him. She came back to me after a few sessions.

‘Deborah,’ she said, ‘I think he’s deaf.’

I couldn’t believe I’d missed it, that his parents had missed it, that he had survived at school for so long without anyone knowing. Maybe because he had a good friend, who sat next to him, and told him everything the teacher said.

Now, years later, due to an underlying condition, I’m deaf too. Without my very powerful bone-implanted hearing aids, the world is muffled, as though wrapped in cotton wool, remote, unreachable. That incident, with the boy, it broke me in retrospect.

This is why one of the stories in my book, Winter Lights, is based on that experience, written from the point of view of a deaf boy at Christmas. He’s not completely deaf, but there is much he misses out on. His friend, Orla, tries to help him. And the angry teacher, stressed and tired, and unable to understand why he’s ‘such a pain’ – well, she’s me.

Here’s part of the story: –

Once did Orla Davis…

Jesus is looking cranky. No one else mentions this, cooing and smiling at him in admiration. But Tyler does, because he notices things. As the line of hopping children files past the stable scene, he brings his face up very close. Yep, cranky as hell. That’s what his mum always says about his sister when she looks that way – forehead creased, mouth turned done, rigid arms with fist balls. Perhaps his nappy needs changing. Or he’s hungry. Or he’s in a bad mood for being born.

Mum says that about Elsie when she’s cranky.

‘She’s in a bad mood for being born.’ Tyler likes to hear the story because he comes out of it well. Elsie was late, so they inducted her (or was it infused?) but even then, she took ages to come out and in the end the doctor had to hoover her out with a vacuum thing. Whereas Tyler – Mum would ruffle his hair fondly at this point – came out bang on time. With little fuss and no tearing.

He doesn’t really know what that means but it must be something to do with not ripping in two. Though when he told Orla Davis, she squeaked and shouted, ‘It’s to do with your mum, not you, numbskull! Ask her!’ But he hasn’t.

He likes the story the way it is. It cheers him up when he’s feeling cross with Elsie, when it feels like she sucks up all the love in the house, leaving a space where his should be. When Mum tells the story, he feels special.

He stares at the Virgin Mary, pressing his face up close to the crib, wondering if Jesus had done it without tearing. Mary gazes back at him, calmly. She’s not at all like his mum, he thinks, with her smooth skin, covered hair and patient expression. His mum has freckles and springy curls which she runs through her hands. She rushes around all day saying things like ‘For Pete’s sake!’ and ‘Hells bells!’. Unless she sits down – then she falls promptly asleep. She never used to be like this, before Elsie was born. But babies make you crazy. This is what he’s noticed. Particularly if you have a husband who works away. And a farty dog.

He stares glumly at Jesus, all small and cranky in his wooden crib, and then at his adoring parents. Joseph is on the edge of things behind a shepherd. Tyler reaches out grubby fingers and moves him closer to Jesus. He gives the baby a secret nod.

‘At least your dad’s here,’ he tells him. ‘Mine prob’ly won’t be back ‘til Christmas Eve. He’ll miss the carols. Again.’

He sighs and pulls his head back away from the stable scene. But when he turns round, the line has gone. At the other end of the parish church, the rest of the class is jostling for places in the choir stalls. He makes to run and join them.

But Miss Flack is standing in front of him, hands on hips.

‘What do you think you’re doing, Tyler Ferguson?’ Her face is red and her mouth working furiously. ‘Did I actually see you touch him?’

‘Sorry, Miss, touch who?’

Tyler glances around. He often gets in trouble for touching people, but there’s no one around.

He squints up at the teacher. She’s standing in a fall of light from the stained-glass window, her face a patchwork of coloured squares. He imagines pushing her over, face-first, into the paintbox he got for his birthday. He bats the thought away.

Miss Flack grows taller. She is thin with big hair, a furious isosceles triangle (they’ve just done shape in Maths and Tyer is pleased he can remember this.) She looms over him, and he steps back into the crib scene. It wobbles dangerously.

‘Stand still!’ He freezes.

‘I have told you,’ she shouts, ‘countless times, not to touch!’

Tyler lifts his chin and tries to look at her. He is scared of her – they all are – and he can’t quite bring himself to meet her eye. He says nothing. There is no point. Miss Flack hates him. This is because he never gets things right. Somehow, he gets the wrong end of the stick, misunderstands, doesn’t listen…

You can read the rest of this story along with others about different characters struggling with life in the run-up to Christmas, in my book Winter Lights. The e-book version is on special offer until early next week. Winter Lights was a Love Reading Star Book and Book of the Month. 

Click here to buy the book.

If you buy it, I hope it gives you the festive feels it gave me when I wrote it 🙂