Page 39 of The Sign for Home

“Cyril, you are unbelievable. You’re managing to simultaneously be both drama queen and self-hating homosexual.Godverdomme. He was just so nervous when I talked about anything to do with relationships, so I thought it meant he might be gay. You used to act the same way: turn the conversation back to me, evade questions. So I just asked. It’s not an unreasonable question.”

“But what if he says something to his uncle or Molly?”

“Cyrilje, he’s not going to say anything to anyone.”

“What were you talking about at the elevator?”

“I don’t understand—”

“At the elevator, what secret did he tell you?”

Hanne took a breath and I thought she was going to respond, but instead she made up some excuse about having to study for her microbiology test. Then she hung up. I called back three times, but she didn’t answer.

15CRAZY CHARLES

The next day I saw Arlo waiting for the Able-Ride outside Hudson Hall. I apologized if Hanne had asked anything too personal. Arlo said he didn’t mind and that he liked talking with her. I kept fishing for him to tell me the secret he told Hanne, but instead he started asking me how long I had known Hanne, and how old she was when she came over from Belgium, and had I met her husband and kid, and even whether she was a Christian or not. His questioning was a curious mix of earnest interest and suspicion.

“Before, high school—you two sweethearts?”

“No,” I signed with a laugh. I had become an ace at giving vague answers to consumers’ personal questions. “She’s not my type. We were just best friends.”

“Best friends—most important,” Arlo signed, grinning broadly. It appeared that me having a best friend surprised him a little.The interpreter is human after all.

“Yeah. Having someone like Hanne as a best friend has been pretty fun. Everyone in high school thought it was cool that she was from Belgium. She was really popular, which made things easier for me since it shielded me from a lot of bullying.”

“Bully you?” Arlo asked with disbelief. “Really?”

“Sometimes. Not as bad as some of the other kids. But there was alwayssome asshole that wanted to tease me because of my red hair, or other stupid reasons.”

Arlo got that familiar look he gets just before he zones out. But that time he didn’t disappear inside his head. Instead, he just smiled and asked me the time. I told him, and he said the van would, hopefully, be coming in twenty minutes, and did I want to hear his story about a bully.

“Sure,” I signed, eagerly wanting any biographical crumb that might illuminate the riddle that was Arlo Dilly. “I’d like to hear it.”

“But shhh,” he signed, pressing his finger to his lips. “Secret. Just between you and me, okay?”

“Sure.”

And he told me…

Mid-October of your junior year. You had just gotten back to the Rose Garden School after spending a weekend at home, since Brother Birch was helping to organize a three-day conference and wanted you and Molly to participate and to inspire. Your mama didn’t come to the conference because she had a bad cold, but still you got to see her in the morning and at night before bed. It was hard leaving your mama, but you were excited to be back at school with friends who spoke your language.

One day you walked into your dorm room and found Big Head Lawrence crying on his bed. Martin explained how one of the sighted students told Big Head Lawrence that there was a new older boy at school who had joined the Deaf Devils, and he was meaner and bigger than all the rest. His name was Crazy Charles (“C” hand turns around the ear to indicate craziness) and he was already eighteen and only in tenth grade because he had gotten held back at his old school, where he was kicked out—or that’s what the rumor said.

“Crazy Charles brain messed up,” Martin signed. “That’s reason he picks on weaker kids. His ASL—the worst! Not learn sign until age twelve.Can’t sign. Can’t read words. Can’t read lips. Nothing. Now, when someone signs something, if Crazy Charles not understand… he punches hard. Now Deaf Devils even more dangerous!”

Then Martin explained how that afternoon the Deaf Devils and Crazy Charles had drawn mean cartoons of Big Head Lawrence all over the bathroom walls and library desks. Under the drawings they wrote:Big Head Lawrence, Monster Boy.Big Head Lawrence was certain Crazy Charles would be looking to hurt him.

Even though you and Martin tried to comfort him, Big Head Lawrence could not be consoled.

“Will not leave room until I graduate,” Big Head Lawrence insisted.

If only your vision had been stronger you would have forced this bully Crazy Charles to clean up all the mean drawings. You felt helpless.

“From now on we three must stay together all the time,” Martin signed. “Then Crazy Charles can’t bother us.”

So you did stay together as best you could. Weeks passed without incident, but then, on the very last day of the month, you and your roommates were waiting in the lunch line and the other kids started pushing so hard that all three of you became separated. You expected to find each other a few minutes later, safely at your usual lunch table. But then a crush of anxious bodies shoved past you. You worried that there might be a fire, so you followed the rushing crowd. Suddenly you ran into the backs of a huge circle of students all watching something. This meant only one thing: someone was fighting. You began to panic and tried to force your way through the wall of cheering sighted-Deaf students, but it was no use since so many others were elbowing in to get a better view, while you could barely make out the back of the person’s head in front of you. The fight seemed to go on forever. When the teachers finally arrived, the bullies had run off and there were both Martin and Big Head Lawrence on the ground, bleeding.

Big Head Lawrence was too embarrassed to tell the teachers what happened, but later he told you everything. The new bully, Crazy Charles, haddragged Big Head Lawrence out of the lunch line and swung him into a group of three girls. The girls jumped back, causing Big Head Lawrence to fall and smash his head on the ground. This was very dangerous for someone with a head like Lawrence’s, so he got scared and started to cry. No one helped him up for fear that Crazy Charles or one of the Deaf Devils would get mad at them. The big circle of students formed around Crazy Charles and Big Head Lawrence. Unfortunately, not blind enough, Big Head Lawrence was able to make out the faces of the Deaf Devil gang, along with three girls, staring down at him on the floor, laughing and signing things likedisgusting, ugly, monster.

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