Chapter 15
ELIAS
Days like this remind me how lucky I am to be a dad. Cal and Miya are lying on the living room floor with the lights off and curtains drawn, using her phone flashlight to make shadow puppets on the ceiling.
Matty is on the couch with a cup of tea to ease his sore throat I feel a little guilty for, but he’s smiling and playing along when Cal looks to him for involvement.
He's been here such a short time, but he’s already a staple in our daily routines. Anytime Cal and I go out, the first thing he does when he comes home is seek Matty out. If Matty is at work, Cal will wander through the living room at random intervals until he comes home.
Home.
Miya looks up from their shadow puppet show with a knowing, empathetic look. She flicks her eyes from me to Matty, and fuck it, I don't have to fight it anymore.
I walk over to the couch, watching as Matty switches between playing along and looking down at his Kindle, and rest my arms on the back staring down at him.
He’s got his hair in this half up, half down style that keeps it out of his eyes but still has it cascading across his shoulders.
His legs are crossed with his tea mug sitting in a little crotchet cup holder on one knee while the Kindle rests on the other.
It’s the picture of perfect comfort paired with form fitting joggers and a gray tank sporting a pink, blue, and white bubbly heart.
Cute as shit.
He tips his head and meets me for a kiss as I fold my arms across the back of the couch. “Whatcha reading?”
He smiles against my lips and raises his arm to cup the back of my neck. “An angsty little queer book about a golden retriever boy in love with an adorably sad boy who isn’t over his ex.”
I snort at the pointed way he describes it, but then he taps the screen a few times and shows me the soft, colorful cover: Double Hit by Katie Steele.
“Cute, but maybe don’t take inspiration from romance novels.
” When our lips touch this time, he playfully pulls my bottom lip between his teeth, bedroom eyes making my dick stir.
“You tease me, but I go to work in a few hours and will have endless material to make your night a very frustrating one.”
He pouts and tugs me closer, and I sink my fingers into his hair to guide his mouth into a deeper kiss.
“You padding around half naked is frustrating enough,” he grumbles, and I pull back to playfully flick his nose.
“Maybe if someone didn’t keep running off with my t-shirts …”
He sticks his tongue out, and I hear Cal giggle from his spot on the floor. I touch my nose to Matty’s, basking in his peaceful smile, eyes closed and fingers absently playing in my hair.
It’s way too soon to be uttering words like love, especially when this is a temporary indulgence at best, but letting myself have this with him has opened the floodgates.
I’ve been mildly obsessed with Matty from the moment we met, and sharing a bed—sharing moments like this—has only deepened that obsession.
The way he holds me to him with an unwavering grip makes me think he’s maybe a little bit obsessed with me too.
Miya insists on taking the three of us out, so we all agree to hit up Randy’s Diner. She’s frequented the place the handful of times she’s visited over the years, and it’s sort of my happy place.
Rascal is the only guy at the club who identifies as anything other than straight, and though the others are cool with it, there’s a certain degree of cis straight white dude energy that kind of gets to you after a while.
That’s why the two of us hit up the place after work sometimes; it’s a way to unwind.
Matty brings Cal on occasion when I’m at work, more often if I end up taking an earlier shift or if Cal is having one of his rough nights and Matty feels like they need a reset.
There’s something about Randy’s that puts Matty at ease. Even more so than being at home. I love how comfortable he’s gotten, but there’s still a stark difference compared to his demeanor when we all get set up in our booth.
Cal and I are both on the inside with Miya on the other side of him and Matty beside me. Hannah is working today, and Matty’s face absolutely lights up. She gets everyone’s drink orders, passing signs back and forth with Matty, and it makes my chest twinge the slightest bit.
He hardly signs at home. Occasionally small ones, but nothing I couldn’t easily figure out by watching him and asking him to repeat it a couple of times.
He wears his hearing aids most of the time, or at the very least the left one; he mentioned once that he lost most of the hearing in his left ear in an accident but that the right has learned to compensate.
Still, he gets tired and it makes his head hurt, so he has a second one that eases the pressure, but he really only uses it when he’s out and about.
Right now, though, as Hannah returns with everyone’s drinks—hot chocolate for Matty, coffee for Miya, chocolate milk for Cal, and plain ole water for me—Matty takes both of them out and places them in their case which goes back in his pocket.
After a quiet moment, I nudge his side, and while flicking his tongue at the whipped cream in his cup, he inclines his head toward me.
“Are they bothering you?” I tap his ear, and he smiles softly.
He lifts his free hand to tap his fingers together in a sign I instantly recognize as ‘no’. At first he doesn’t elaborate, just sips from his cup with happy hums and a content smile, but when he catches my gaze still trained on him, he sets the cup down and turns to me more fully.
He holds both of his hands up, palms facing me, and then points to my face. Figuring he wants me to pay attention, I nod, and it earns me a smile.
‘Thank you’. I understand that one.
It’s slower for me to catch the next set, but Matty signs them slowly, three or four times until my eyes light up in recognition, and his smile grows.
‘This is my safe space.’
A few more signs, ones I recognize from his frequent use. ‘I can still hear you, but the chatter is quieter.’
He’s mentioned before that without his aids his range of hearing gets smaller, and it’s easier for him to tune out the background noise.
In busy places it can be distracting and hard for him to concentrate.
It makes him rely on lip reading and close proximity more, but he doesn’t mind it so long as he’s comfortable with the people he’s talking to.
Like us.
I focus on the handful of words that I know—half of which are from learning for a period of time to see if Cal could communicate that way—and respond in a painfully slow manner.
‘Whatever you need. At home, too. Okay?’
His smile is a little more reserved, but he gives a slow nod.
It makes my stomach twist a bit uncomfortably.
From the beginning, I’d known he was hard-of-hearing and used signs intermittently.
Hannah had told me that he was still learning himself, but that he would appreciate any effort to meet him where he’s at.
I studied up on the rusty words I knew, tried to follow along with Hannah whenever I stopped by the diner, but then Matty had moved in and … I hardly ever saw him use it.
He always says that as long as he can see my lips moving and things aren’t too loud, then he can hear me just fine. He’s never switched to sign at home as far as I can tell. Not other than the occasional word thrown out here and there.
Why does that bother me?
Matty’s conversation with Miya goes a lot smoother.
After Cal got his diagnosis at two, his speech therapist had pushed heavily for incorporating ASL to give him another option for communication, and there’s a handful that he picked up easily enough and still uses sometimes: more, again, yes, no, and of course baby shark.
Miya had jumped head first into the ASL train, and while I had floundered to get a good grasp on it, she was an absolute natural.
It definitely feeds the icky little voice in my brain telling me the only reason it didn’t work out for Cal and I is because I didn’t push myself hard enough.
When he got his communication device and started making progress there, I basically dropped all notion of learning the language.
It makes me feel extra shitty to watch Matty and Miya talk and have no clue what they’re saying half of the time.
I must be missing a good chunk of the conversation because something waving in my face alerts me to my sister’s concerned stare, and when I glance over, I catch Matty with a deep frown.
‘You okay?’
I nod terse and stiff, but that doesn’t seem to appease either of them. Miya signs something, and—dammit, I can’t follow—Matty’s brow dips in response.
“I’m right here,” I say a little more roughly than I should, and Miya crosses her arms on the table.
“And? It’s not like you were participating in the conversation. Hello, airhead; I thought you might enjoy spending time with your only sister.”
“I am when I know what the heck you’re saying. I’m not trying to be a downer. I’m just tired.”
She huffs but her eyes soften. “Sorry. I figured since you and Matty lived together that …”
I shake my head. “This is the most I’ve seen him sign since we met.”
Surprise passes over her, and out of the corner of my eye I see Matty’s hands move. The gross feeling in my stomach is spilling over, and I put a hand over my eyes to try and fight back the pulse of irritation threatening to pound into my skull.
Stop getting frustrated. Take a break. Give yourself a moment.
Fingers lightly graze my shoulder, and every bit of acquired calm crumples into a heap. “Stop!” I put a hand up and stare down at the table.
It recedes ever so slightly when Matty places his hand over mine.
I hate feeling like a failure; Even more, I hate when other people have to witness it.
‘I’m sorry,’ he signs, but that only makes it worse. I don’t want him to be sorry. I don’t want him to ever have to apologize for any part of himself. Not to me.