Chapter 24
Rachel
“Okay, listen up, because I don’t want to be here all day.” I glared at the club—men and old ladies—who were barely listening to a word I said.
I drummed my fingernails on the bar, waiting for them to pay attention, but most of them talked amongst themselves.
Treat them like Axel. Patience. Endless fucking patience. Do not lose your temper. Not in front of Dante. Count to ten.
Although, I had a feeling counting to ten wouldn’t be anywhere near high enough to cope with the blood pressure these idiots gave me.
I got to seven before I called it quits.
These people were not Axel—thank fuck—and they did not respond to patience. They responded to power.
Reaching out for the bell hanging over the bar, I rang it as loud as I could.
“Oi!” I shouted, grinning at some of the grimaces people had on their faces.
“Oh, don’t start! I couldn’t give a fuck if some of you have sore heads—I mean you, Vienna,” I muttered without even looking his way.
“I have you all for an hour, and I expect you to pay attention to every single second. If you’re not going to take it seriously, you can fuck off now.
Otherwise, drop whatever is in your hands and prepare to learn . ”
I heard Dante chuckle at the side of me, but I refused to look in his direction. I couldn’t get his words out of my head from last night, and I had woken up this morning alone, feeling like a fucking fool.
He had already taken Axel downstairs and given him his breakfast, as well as seeing Bee to school.
I told him he should have woken me, but he shot me a withering look and said he wanted to let me sleep, since I couldn’t stop talking about how tired I was.
And I didn’t want it to affect my attitude, did I?
I didn’t dignify that with an answer.
He had paid Heather extra to stay and watch Axel for us and then called a club meeting so I could finally put my plan in motion and teach them all some sign language.
I was grateful that he was actually listening to me for a change. But he wasn’t exactly making my job easier being so close to me all the bloody time.
“Over there,” I snapped at him, pointing at the rest of the club.
“Excuse me?” He laughed.
“You heard me. You’re not the club leader right now. You’re a student, just like everyone else. And you can sit with the rest of the willing students. Over there, please.”
He sighed, but he pushed himself from his chair at my side and went to the other side of the bar, pulling it out with far more force than necessary. He shot me a look that clearly was meant to say, “happy now?” and shook his head at me.
“Thank you. First things first. How much do you all know?”
“This,” Bambi yelled, sticking his middle finger up at me. A couple of the other men laughed, but I noticed the old ladies rolling their eyes.
“Har, har, har, the comedic genius knows the universal sign for fuck off. Now you can do exactly that.”
“What?” He said, still laughing.
“I mean it. Fuck off,” I snapped, pointing at the door. “If you’re going to treat this as a joke, you can get the fuck out.”
“No, I—” He was no longer laughing.
“Too late. Fuck off. I happen to think helping Bee learn to navigate her new voice is probably the most important thing right now, and no laughing matter. I can only assume you don’t think it’s important?”
“I do but—”
“But what? It was more important for you to act the class clown?”
“List—”
“No. I won’t listen. You had your warning, now fuck off!” I hissed, emphasising the last few words by gritting my teeth.
He looked at Dante for backup, and I saw him shrug out of the corner of my eye. He knew better than to argue.
“You heard the lady,” he said, and I heard the laugh in his tone, but he had the decency to hold it back.
Bambi got up and grumbled under his breath before he looked up and met my eyes. “Rachel, look… I’m sorry.”
“Good. You should be. And you can join next time. Or you can make the effort to learn by yourself. But you won’t be here today.”
I folded my arms and continued glaring at him until he walked out the doors, still muttering under his breath.
“Anyone else?” I asked pleasantly once the doors were firmly closed.
“I see nothing has changed. You’re still a bitch,” Greg muttered.
“Well, Malfoy, I’m the only one here to teach you. So unless you want to join our friend Bambi, you’ll shut up and put up. Now, I’ll ask again. What do we know?”
Closing in on nearly an hour later, and I was starting to realise this was going to be much harder than I realised.
“How can this be so fucking difficult? It’s how are you,” I repeated, putting the back of my fingers together and curling them, before pointing one finger at the crowd. “How. Are. You.” I repeated the gesture.
The old ladies had nailed it. They were in the corner, moving on to other phrases.
Jenna had told me she had been practicing, and after showing me a few phrases, I gave her the go ahead to form her own group with the old ladies, and I’d tackle the men.
She had dropped Trex in the back with Heather, who was ecstatic to have more babies, and had jumped in headfirst to teach them.
I didn’t worry about the women in the slightest.
But these fucking idiot men were another matter.
I pinched the bridge of my nose, shaking my head when I saw Vienna shove Shark when Shark told him he was doing it wrong.
“Tell him, Rachel,” Vienna hissed, tugging on my sleeve to get my attention. “Tell Shark he’s wrong.”
“I would genuinely rather sweep the Sahara with a broomstick,” I muttered back, ripping my arm away from Vienna and walking to the other end of the bar to see what the others were up to.
I had paired them up, and each duo looked like they were on the edge of starting a brawl. Sunshine flipped Tools the bird. Ant told Doc to get his fingers out of his face before he snapped them. And the others weren’t faring much better.
“It’s like this, isn’t it, Rachel?” Riley said, making some weird fucking gesture with his hands that was nowhere near “how are you,” and more like the fucking worm with his fingers.
“Not quite,” I said as pleasantly as possible, though I was grinding my teeth, and my smile was tight. “Let’s break it down. Everyone! Watch me and Riley.”
I repeated the movement as slowly as I possibly could. Riley copied it and actually nailed it.
“Perfect! Okay, let’s speed it up a little this time, yeah?” I repeated the movement, and he fumbled at the faster pace, but he still did it pretty damn good.
“Fantastic! Okay, now turn to Vienna and ask him.”
Riley looked at me and beamed in response to my smile, and turned to Vienna. “How are you?” He said the words as he signed, and the smile froze on my face.
What the fuck was that? What in the actual fuck was that?
Riley turned to me and I swear his spine grew ten inches out of his ass and was waggling at me like a fucking puppy's tail. He was that proud of his achievement.
“Riley,” I gritted out. “In the politest way possible, what in the ever loving shite was that?”
“Eh?” He frowned, his body stiffening. “I did exactly what you did!”
“Did you? Because I did this,” I did the gesture. “What you just asked Vienna looked like a drunken Friday night at the club.”
“Ayoooo! In the clurb, we all fam!” Vienna boomed, raising his pint glass at me.
“Not now, Vienna! And it’s not even lunchtime—in fact, it’s not even brunch time! Put the beer down! Fuck me!”
“Rude,” he muttered, earning himself a beer mat thrown at him frisbee style from Doc.
“I did the exact same thing you were so amazed by, just sped up! It’s called sign language, Rachel,” Riley said, completely ignoring Vienna.
“It wasn’t fucking sign language!” I snapped, feeling like pulling my own hair out. “You men are fluent in so many fucking languages. How is this so difficult to grasp?”
“Give me one other language we know,” Dante challenged, sounding proud of his ignorance.
“Challenge accepted,” I said, and began counting on my fingers. “English, audacity, arrogance, and spite. There you go, four languages. Should I keep going?”
“Shame you’re not fluent in being a decent teacher,” Vienna muttered.
“Yeah, and it’s no wonder you don’t have an old lady if you can’t even move your fucking fingers properly! How. Are You,” I repeated for the final time, feeling my temper reach its limit. “One at a time. Show me.”
I watched as each man did their version of “how are you?” and figured it was good enough.
“Fine. Next. I can’t go over that one more time. Moving on. Are you hungry?” I signed, and each man signed it back more or less correct. Although that was an easy one.
“Okay, great. Okay,” I repeated, closing my eyes and taking a deep breath.
Remember the contract, Rachel!
“Riley,” I said, my eyes still closed. “I’m sorry for snapping at you.
You did really good.” I opened my eyes and focused on him, giving him what I hoped was a reassuring smile.
“It’s fine that you did it slower. It’s actually something we can work with, and something else we can learn.
There are going to be times where Bee signs faster than you can keep up with.
Do not give up and tell her to write it on her tablet.
Instead, do this,” I brought my dominant arm outstretched, and ran my non dominant hand up it and said “slowly.”
The men copied me, finally beginning to take it seriously.