“Sure,” I said. “Congratulations on Yale. If it’s really what you want.”

Beau stood there in the driveway and waved me off. The conflicted expression on his face was impossible to miss when I peeked at him in the rearview mirror.

Chapter 28

CHAPTER 28

Winter break probably should’ve been called spring break in the end. Once finals were over and school was out for two weeks, unseasonably warm weather arrived out of nowhere, melting the snow and bringing almost seventy degrees every day. Whenever I would marvel about this, Nina would sign, HAHAHA, and tell me to get used to it, because this apparently wasn’t anything out of the ordinary for Colorado.

I got two days into the new semester before I finally broke down and told Mom, “I want to get a job.”

She did a double take, looking up from her dinner plate like I’d grown another head.

REALLY? she signed.

YES, I signed back. I THINK GOOD FOR ME.

YES, Mom agreed quickly. BUT . . . SCHOOL IMPORTANT.

I KNOW, I signed. BUT JOB IMPORTANT, SAME.

It wasn’t like I wanted to pick up full-time work at a credit union or a department store, but something simpler, like a cashier or hostess at a restaurant. Nina worked part-time at a nearby Target, and she had at least double the workload at school.

The more time I spent with my hearing friends, the more I realized I needed to be out in the hearing world—even if it made me uncomfortable—so I could get used to communicating and handling certain situations. I needed to be ready for anything college and beyond might throw my way. I knew being Deaf wasn’t going to hold me back, and I was ready to prove that, even if it wasn’t in a hospital just yet.

OK, Mom signed hesitantly. YOU WANT JOB, I SUPPORT YOU.

The expression on her face was a little less than pleased, but she knew as well as I did that sooner or later I was going to have to get a job. We both knew that just because I was Deaf did not mean I couldn’t work. I didn’t just want to sign up for social security payments after graduation and call it good. I wanted more than that.

THANK YOU, I signed.

Connor cut in right after Mom signed, WHERE? and tapped the table, wanting to know what we were signing about.

“Later, squirt,” I said. “Finish your dinner.”

I pulled out my laptop after I helped Mom clean up the dinner dishes, got Google up, and dove right into my job search. Chances were a lot of businesses might be letting their holiday workers go now that we were a couple weeks into the new year, so I didn’t know how many job openings I might find. The sooner I got applications out there, the better off I’d be.