hope I can see the light skew — willow/yahel

[ines izar d11a 🖤 cait]

yahel //

Mum and dad mean well. I know this. I appreciate them. They’ve given up so much of their time and energy to try and make my new life bearable, albeit with limited success. I guess it’s hard having to navigate a whole new world. I wonder if they feel just as blind as I do.

It shouldn’t surprise me that they don’t let up: my parents are the most stubborn and determined people I’ve ever met. But it’s been a full year of trying and trying and trying to fit in, so forgive me for being less than enthusiastic when the next suggestion comes: lessons in braille.

Like, I’m so fine. Totally fine! Yeah, okay, maybe I won’t be able to read a book ever again, but isn’t that why audiobooks were invented? And it’s not like I’ve just magically forgotten the alphabet – I can (probably) still string a few sentences together on paper, if I concentrate reallyyyy hard and space out the letters reallyyyy well. I tell them this, with well-formulated arguments and rebuttals at the ready, but it’s – as usual – non-negotiable. Everything with my health is.

They mean well. I know this. But they’re not the ones living with the mutation.

So that’s how I come to find myself being ushered into a private room of the library at 4pm on the second Tuesday back at school by Ms. Plinkett, who insists on reassuring me that the arrangement “will be extremely confidential,” whatever that means. Can’t really get any more anonymous than a tutoring session between two blind guys, but sure I guess.

Ms. Plinkett leaves, then returns approximately eight minutes later with another set of footsteps trailing behind her. She speaks in hushed tones to the newcomer, but I politely tune her out, knowing fully well I could more than easily eavesdrop thanks to what I can only describe as my supersonic hearing skills. Finally, she leaves, punctuated by a closed door and receding footsteps. A chair scrapes against the floor. There’s a few seconds of silence, before:

“The last four kids that tried tutoring me didn’t last a week, just so you know,” I lie, straight to his face, but don’t ask me why I do it.

“I’m a lost cause. You should quit while you’re ahead.”

[✌ʕ•ᴥ•ʔ]

W I L L O W

"I'm really not a therapist, professor," he says, arms raised almost defensively.

"Of course not, you're a child," Teressa says, a light laugh falling off her lips, "We're only asking you to help him with braille, Mr. Tremblay."

"Ah, and my parents are okay with this?" Willow asks. There's a slightly pained look on his face, self preservation or- "You know they'll take it out on you if people find out, don't you?"

She squeezes his shoulder, "He needs someone who can understand him."

Willow knows that he can't. He hasn't been through what he has, he's never lost something so integral to him. He doesn't argue further though, he's curious as much as he's careful and he's never met someone with a single imperfection, not in the eddies that he lives in.

He nods.

Teressa places a hand on his shoulder and then guides him further into the room. King described this one to him before, the library. There are large, arch-like windows lining two walls, all with many panes soldered together with metal, letting in plenty of light. The school is wealthy, there are rows of stacks, each full of books. Lastly, there are large, circular tables, each can seat up to eight people.

Willow feels the curve of the edge with his palm, running it along the polished wood. Strange how wood always feels warmer than stone, lighter too.

He raises his head at the sound of the other student's voice, quickly taking in the tone, turned decidedly downwards. Willow's head falls to the side a bit, then he puts a slim hardcover down on the table between them, not hard enough to be shocking, just enough to announce an entrance.

"Good thing that I'm just here to teach you braille then," Willow says lightly "Yahel, right? Hold out your hand."

[ines izar d11a 🖤 cait]

yahel //

There’s a sound to hesitancy. In the shuffle of his feet across the padded carpet. In the beats of silence after I speak, where he regards me curiously. All of these cues I collect and interpret, for better or worse, and I think he might want to leave. I wouldn’t blame him, or stop him. But even if he wants to be far away from this room as badly as I do, he presses forward under the guise of responsibility and comes closer.

I don’t flinch as I register the sound of a book resting on the table. Want to laugh at the prop, at its uselessness in a room of blindness. I know why he does it, though. There’s an unspoken language on how to interact with the world. You walk on the right side; your guide walks on the left, holding onto your non-dominant arm so you can feel out your environment more confidently. Other people feel obliged to make as much noise as possible when approaching, so as not to startle you, but the truth is I heard them opening the door from twenty metres away.

I’m still figuring out all of these rules. And I know there’s more lessons to come. I know that’s why he’s here – to make it a little easier for me.

So why do I insist on being difficult?

“Hold out your hand.”

“Do I get to know your name first? Or is that off-limits?”

It was a strange arrangement. All kept very under wraps, for some peculiar reason. Maybe the kid had a reputation to maintain, but it felt almost insulting to have to be kept a secret. The first other blind kid I’d known, and I wouldn’t even get to know anything about them? Seemed a little unfair.

Well, actually, that’s a lie. There was another girl I knew, a few years older than me, with congenital blindness. Their house in the middle of town was one of the first places dad visited seeking answers after my diagnosis. If anyone knew what to do, it would be the Graingers. But even they had given up hope of a miracle.

She was born that way, dad had told me. The family had wasted too long trying to cure her. There simply weren’t enough resources in Three to fund the endeavour. I still wonder what’s the worse of the two evils: to have known the world and to lose it, or to never have had it at all?

I try to place the boy’s voice, but it’s unfamiliar to me. Just another faceless stranger who I may or may not have known, before. I try not to dwell on the way that makes me feel – off-balance, unsettled, like I’ll never have the upper hand on anyone ever again. Instead, I hone in on the empty spaces of the room where words don’t reach, and map out where his face would be. Where it connects to his neck, his torso. I trace an imaginary line down his arm to the palm of his hand, wanting to be the first to make contact, just to prove a point, I don’t need your help.

Too bad I miss my mark, overshooting embarrassingly and grazing against his elbow instead. It’s only a quick recalculation to find his fingertips and rest my own clammy hand lightly against his, though.

See? I don’t need help.