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Deafening




I’ve been deaf since I was ten, due to nerve damage. All I hear is a mild whine, like what you’d call tinnitus. I’m now 30. I’ve learned to lip read pretty well, and have a beautiful wife.

One morning I wake up, walk down the stairs to my wife making coffee. I don’t notice that the perpetual tinnitus has completely ceased when I see her, not till she smiles at me. I smile back, albeit somewhat uneasily. I see her lips say, “Good Morning, sweetie.” She says it in sign language too.

For the first time in 20 years, I hear her. But what I hear isn’t what her lips say. I hear her, (I assume it’s her, but obviously I have no point of reference) say one word.

"Run."

What’d be quiet to you is now staggeringly loud to me.

She smiles again. Her lips say: “How’d you sleep?” “Her” voice says, “Run for your life.”

Years later, and she still visits me in the ward. I can only hear Her. No one else. She speaks to me in a way you would talk to a child; Simple, warm, cautious. Flanked by the orderlies her lips tell me how the kids are, how she loves me, how she hopes I keep getting better.

Her voice tells me to run. To run for my life. It was quiet when it started. over the years it’s gotten louder and louder.

Today, she smiles sweetly, and screams “Run. Run for your life.” Her voice is now deafening.

Credit - reddit user Lupara

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