I'll Never Say I Love You

“Tahara!”

I sighed in relief when I heard Kate calling my name. She was by my side in a second, also smiling at Kyle.

“So you’re Tahara?” Kyle asked me.

I started to nod, but Kate beat me to the punch. “Yes, she is,” she answered quickly. Kyle looked at her. “I’m Kate.”

“Hi, Kate,” Kyle said, somewhat uncertainly, as though wondering why she had joined us.

Kate seemed to get the same impression. “Tahara doesn’t speak,” she offered awkwardly.

Kyle looked at me again, his smile gone, replaced by uncertainty. “You don’t speak?” he questioned.

I shook my head. “Completely mute,” Kate said.

“But how do you communicate?” he asked.

I nudged Kate and handed her the cans, then took a step back from Kyle and raised my hands. ‘I use sign language,’ I signed, knowing that he had no idea what I was saying, but would get the idea.

“Sign language?” he asked. I nodded. He smiled once again. “That is majorly cool. You’re fluent?”

I nodded.

“I’m gonna go give these to the girls,” Kate said, holding up the cans.

“It was nice meeting you, Kate,” Kyle said, smiling at her.

“You too,” she replied. She returned his smile and walked towards the girls. She stopped briefly once she was out of his line of sight to wink at me, grinning, and then continued on.

“Well, I guess conversation between us is going to be a bit hard now,” Kyle said jokingly.
I nodded reluctantly.

“Maybe we could catch up some other time and have a chat?” he asked hopefully, then groaned in frustration. “How stupid of me, we can’t chat. We can...communicate.”

I nodded, smiling. It hurt me that this was as far as we could converse.

“Great,” he said, grinning. His teeth were almost blindingly white. “I guess I’ll see you at school.”

I gave him the thumbs up, nodding and smiling. He smiled at me and walked away.
Surprised and happy, I made my way back to the girls. I stared into space waiting for them to bombard me with questions, thinking. Kyle was cute. He had seemed interested in me. Me! From Kate’s wink, it appeared she was thinking along the same lines. It was nowhere near as good as if it had been Alex talking to me like that, but it certainly came a close second. I couldn’t believe that someone as gorgeous as Kyle would want to talk to me. This new hair certainly was weaving a certain magic over people.

“Tahara, I said, what was his name?”

I was dragged back to reality by Kate practically shouting at me. Obviously I had become so engrossed in thinking about Kyle that I had been ignoring the girls. ‘Kyle,’ I answered.

“He was totally chatting you up, Tahara!” Melissa exclaimed excitedly. “He likes you!”

‘You think so?’ I asked.

“For sure,” Janice chimed in. Like Melissa, she was grinning. “That hair is pulling everyone’s eyes towards you.”

Kate leaned forward, her eyes glittering. “Tell me what happened before I rescued you from standing there like a fish,” she demanded, opening and closing her mouth like a goldfish.

I blushed. ‘Was I really doing that?’ I asked.

“Yeah, but smiling enough to cover it up for the most part,” Janice assured me. I smiled at that. Janice was always honest and undeniably sweet.

“So, he’s new here?” Melissa prompted.

I nodded.

“He seemed really interested by the fact that you don’t speak,” Kate mused. “Strange, don’t you think?”

Melissa nodded her agreement, her wavy caramel hair bouncing. “Most definitely. He must really like you, Tahara,” she said, nudging me.

Once again, I blushed. I blush very easily, in case you haven’t figured that out.

The rest of the night was a frenzy of eating, drinking and generally having a fun time. The night was wonderfully warm, the air filled with citronella. Ray’s dad cooked a barbecue, and people wandered back and forth getting food. We always made sure that one of us was at the table for fear some other group would snatch it if we all left. Occasionally someone else would sit down and chat with us, which was always awkward for me as I disliked having to make my friends translate. Writing things down and displaying them was less awkward for me, so I did that. On the bright side, no one had anything negative to say about my new look, which gave me an ego boost. The curls bothered me, but the people loved them.

Every now and then, Kyle and I would catch each other’s eyes. He already seemed to be fitting in with the ‘jock’ group. He never did come and speak to me again, but those eye locks were enough.

When ten o’clock rolled around, I was reluctant to leave. I met up with Alex in the front yard, and we walked to the sidewalk together.

“So, did you have a good night?” he asked as we sat together on the grass.

I nodded. ‘What about you?’ I signed, not knowing if he could clearly see my message in the limited light available to us.

“Yeah, I had a great time,” he answered, and I was glad he got my message. “Got to hang out with Hannah, got to hang out with the guys, everyone wins.” He looked at me pointedly. “You and I should really hang out more in social situations.”

‘I know, but we run in two different circles,’ I signed. ‘You don’t really seem to get along with my girls, and your guys are too immature to have the patience to deal with me.’

Alex elbowed me playfully. “Be nice to them. They’ll come around in time.”

We saw the distinctive silhouette of Mum’s minivan at the end of the street and stood up. At the same time, Kyle walked out from behind us.

“Hey, Tahara,” he said warmly.

I gave a small wave, smiling.

He smiled back. “I guess I’ll see you on Monday?”

I gave him the thumbs up.

“See you then,” he responded, and started to walk down the street.

“Who’s he?” I heard Alex ask, sounding a bit displeased. I guessed he was feeling protective of me, the way a big brother would.

‘Kyle,’ I answered. ‘He’s new here.’

“I saw the two of you chatting earlier. Is he nice?” he asked, as Mum’s car came to a stop.

‘Very,’ I signed, and walked over to the car. I failed to see Alex scowling in Kyle’s general direction.

Mum dropped Alex home and then drove back to our unit, where Dad was already asleep. I was disappointed that I couldn’t show him my hair, but got over it quickly. I put my pyjamas on, brushed my curls and fell asleep as soon as my head hit the pillow, too tired to pay attention to the fact that my curls were annoying the crap out of my neck.

***

I awoke just before eight the next morning, but refused to get out of bed until my alarm went off at eight. When I saw curls out of the corner of my eye I jumped slightly, wondering who they could belong to, and then remembered they were mine. They were definitely going to take a lot of getting used to.

Mum had already left for work, and Dad was still asleep. I ate some cereal and got ready for work, putting my uniform on, brushing my teeth, putting everything I needed into my work bag – a worn black bag that I didn’t mind getting dirty. I went to put my hair up, and froze. How did one tie up curls? I bit my lip nervously. I cautiously brushed them back and secured them with a hair tie, but the top of my head looked bumpy, for lack of a better word. I would have to ask Bec about that. As I didn’t start until ten, I watched television until quarter to, then walked to work as Dad was still asleep. The cafe Mum owns and runs is on the main street of town, just like all the other shops. When I arrived, it was busy, as it normally was on a Sunday morning. The front of house staff were too busy to notice me as I snuck out to the kitchen.

“Tahara!” Mum said, plating up some food. “We’re swamped this morning. I need you on the coffee machine for a while.”

I gasped. While I had front of house training and was probably better than the people out there were, I couldn’t do it because I was mute, so I was shocked. ‘What if they ask me things?’ I signed, horrified. ‘How am I supposed to answer? How am I supposed to call out what takeaway orders are ready?’

Mum turned and didn’t look at me while she answered. “I’ve already told Cass that as soon as you arrive, she’s going from coffee to serving, as well as keeping an eye on you. Wave to her when you have something ready. If there’s a takeaway she’ll yell it.” She put a plate on the serving counter. “I don’t have time to argue about this, Tahara. Just do it.”

‘Fine,’ I signed, and out to the coffee machine. Cass, the barista, smiled when she saw me. Her blonde-streaked light brown curls bounced as she moved, her bright blue eyes sparkling.

“You’re lucky, I just finished an order. Let’s swap,” she said, walking behind me to the other side of the coffee machine.

I looked at the screen with orders, and started steaming milk. Mum was right – the place really was busy. There were coffee orders backed up. I got my first round ready and waved Cass over. She confirmed that there were no takeaway coffees in this round and went about her business waiting tables.

After doing a few rounds of orders, including a few takeaway ones, my nerves disappeared and I began to feel at home. Making coffee was soothing. Besides, I was good at it. I didn’t get a single coffee sent back with a complaint, and had a few compliments passed on to me by Cass. It made me a lot happier than what being a kitchen hand did, and I decided to ask Mum if I could work the coffee machine more often.

Unfortunately, my happiness was cut short when Jess, another worker, arrived at eleven. She took over for me and I went back out to the kitchen, horrified at the mountain of dishes that sat there waiting for me. This was the busiest Sunday we’d had in a long time.

“Busy day,” Mum commented, echoing my thoughts as I started to places the plates into the tray for the dishwasher. “Thanks for doing that, Tahara.”

‘No problems,’ I replied. ‘I actually really enjoyed it. Can I do it again some time?’

Mum frowned. “We’ll see,” she said uncertainly. “That was only intended as a one off, but if we can figure something out with the other staff, I’m sure you could be out there on a more regular basis.”

I smiled and set about my work.