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When a tiny hand touched his elbow, Caleb damn-near jumped out of his skin before looking down to see a small child with a gap-toothed grin staring at him. Caleb had never really been great with kids. That was all Wren and a couple of the other baristas who loved making them laugh with exaggerated ASL jokes and giving out free cookies.
His eyes flickered to the kid’s hearing aids—a little decal of Iron Man on her ear molds—and it made him smile. He glanced up at the counter to find a woman and a man chatting with Luke. It was obvious from the woman’s signs she was far from fluent, and the man beside her gently corrected her once or twice.
Caleb’s gaze cut back to the kid. “Hi.”
The kid’s smile grew wider. “Hi.” She dropped one hand in front of her, frowning and poking her tongue out of her mouth as she started to twist his fingers into letters. “L I L A.”
Caleb copied her, then asked, “That’s you?”
She nodded enthusiastically. “Lila!”
If she had a hearing mom, it was likely she didn’t have a sign name yet. He offered her a fist-bump which she returned with a small tap of her knuckles. “I’m Caleb,” he told her, making his signs extremely slow. If her parents were anything like his, she had less than a dozen words in her vocabulary, and most of them would probably be home-signs. “Did you get a cookie?”
Her eyes went wide. “Cookies? For me?”
He laughed and stood up, offering her his hand and she took it, hopping with all the energy of a child he could only vaguely remember having. She skipped at his side as they approached the counter, and the woman turned, her eyes going wide and horrified.
“Oh my God,” she said aloud, then slapped a hand over her mouth. “Sorry,” she said, quickly switching to sign. “Sorry. My daughter.”
Caleb waved her off and met the gaze of the guy at her elbow before his eyes widened in surprise. He vaguely recognized him from a couple of Deaf events. He was a hearing CODA who worked with a couple organizations making sure all their events were accessible. And, if Caleb remembered right, he was a DJ on the side. He was also pretty sure he and Wren had slept together a few times, but it was years back, and Caleb had long-since lost track of Wren’s conquests.
The guy seemed to recognize him though, if the look on his face was anything to go by.
“Your daughter?” Caleb asked.
The guy laughed and shook his head. “I’m her caseworker.”
Caleb’s brows flew up. “Please tell me CPS isn’t…”
The woman seemed to catch enough of this because she waved her hand to get his attention. “I’m adopting her.”
Caleb bristled for a second, but he forced himself to relax. This woman was very clearly learning more for her child than his own parents had done for him. “I’m Caleb.”
“Penny,” she signed, messing up her Ns twice, but he got the gist.
“She’s signing up for ASL 101 on campus,” the guy said. Then he laughed and shook his head. “You don’t remember me, do you?”
“DJ. Fucked Wren?” Caleb asked.
The guy’s cheeks pinked, but he nodded. “Anthony,” he spelled, then gave his sign name.
Right. The foggy memories cleared just a little. Anthony had really liked Wren, but Wren was his usual self about dating. Caleb felt a little pulse of sympathy for the guy. He felt it for everyone who fell for his brother and walked away with a tender, aching heart.
“Nice to see you again,” Caleb signed, then froze when a tiny hand tugged on his shirt.
He looked down to see Lila staring up at him with a demanding expression. “Cookie.”
Caleb laughed and pointed to Luke who was holding out a tray of character cookies Jori had finished working on that morning. Lila moved to the side of the counter with Penny, and Anthony moved in close to Caleb.
“I saw that look on your face,” Anthony said.
Caleb tried to play innocent. “What?”
“She’s a good person,” Anthony went on. “Lila had been with four families before she got to Penny. She’s the first mom willing to learn.”
Caleb sighed. “I know. I’m not…this isn’t me being judgmental. It just sucks.”
“This is the best of a bad situation. And it’s been a hellish journey. She’s a single mom, and it took six months to get anyone to even look at her application. The last judge we saw wanted Penny to sign a form stating she’d get Lila CIs the moment the adoption was finalized.”
