The guy at the booth nods. I reach for my wallet once the price lights up on the register and slide the cash beneath the glass. He gives me the change and says something I don’t catch. But my friends have stepped toward the door and are scrolling through their phones.
“What was that?” I ask him.
He repeats what he’d said, but I can’t hear it or read it on his lips since he’s behind a computer screen.
“I’m sorry, what?” I point to my ear and then the glass. I try to get my friends’ attention.
Kelsey steps forward. “What’s up?”
“Can you tell me what he’s saying?” I ask, gesturing back to the window.
But the worker rolls his eyes, pulling the ticket from the printer and handing it to me. He dismissively waves me away as he tosses the receipt in the trash.
“Never mind,” I tell Kelsey as we head inside the building. Of course it was about the receipt. I should have just defaulted to “no, thanks” and moved things along for everyone.
At the snack counter, Kelsey gets a slushie and Riley asks for Junior Mints. I don’t want to spend more money, but I’m starving and will need popcorn to get me through the next three hours of explosions and indecipherable dialogue. There’s no way I’m renting a pair of those sticky and hideous captioning glasses that theaters offer as an excuse to not put captions on-screen. They’re the last thing I want on my face when I’m out with my friends. The machine doesn’t work most of the time anyway.
While waiting for me to get my food, Kelsey and Riley run into some other kids from our school, so they once again aren’t with me to repeat anything the cashier says.
“One medium popcorn, please.” I hand over the money to the girl behind the counter, who then asks me something.
“No, thanks.” I smile. I don’t need the receipt, so I’m not going through that whole ordeal again.
She turns around to fill the container, and then hands it back to me along with the receipt. I walk away and grab a handful. Crap. What I’d said no to was the butter.
I join my friends, too irritated to bother figuring out what everyone’s discussing, especially since there seem to be two separate conversations happening across the circle.
I nudge Riley. “Hey, should we get to our seats?”
“Yeah, sure,” she says, turning to get Kelsey. “Let’s go. I don’t want to miss the trailers.”
Riley and Kelsey lead the way to our seats and sit side by side, leaving me at the end of the row. “Do you mind if I sit in the middle?” Still standing, I offer up my snack. “I can share.”
“That’s okay,” Kelsey says, staying in her spot between Riley and me. “I’m so full.”
The lights dim and the first trailer starts. “Ah yes!” Riley points to the screen, saying something excitedly toward Kelsey and me.
I plunk down and stuff my face with popcorn.
A few times during the movie, I nudge Kelsey and ask, “What’d they say?” But she either repeats it staring straight at the screen or whispers it directly into my ear. Neither works, because I can’t hear her when she’s facing forward or read her lips when they’re beside my ear.
Ah well, whatever. The superhero is saving the day; that much is obvious.
* * *
“You’ve been quiet,” Kelsey tells me once we emerge from the theater back into the daylight. “Are you all right?”
“Yeah,” I say, attempting to shrug off the listening fatigue. I’m exhausted and ready for a nap. “Do you guys want to do something next week?”
“Sure,” Kelsey says. “I just can’t on Monday ’cause I’m going into Chicago to interview for that summer internship.”
“Right, I almost forgot!” Riley says. “That would be so cool if you got that.”
“Nah, I mean, it’s mostly just answering phones and things like that.” Based on the way Kelsey talks about the job, it must be a cool position. I remember her mentioning it before, but I wasn’t able to catch the company’s name. “There’re several positions. You both should apply, too. We could take the train into the city together all summer.”
“I wish,” Riley says. “But I’m not about that office life yet. I’m going back to the coffee shop and teaching dance lessons.”
We stop in front of the car. For a moment, I wonder if I’ll get the passenger seat this time, but we all climb back into our usual spots. When the engine starts, so does the loud music. Riley looks over her shoulder to tell me something.
“What?” I ask. “Can you turn off the music real quick?”
Riley lowers the volume. “Do you think you’ll apply for the internship?”
What I really want to say is that answering phones and taking coffee orders both seem like impossible tasks to me. Instead, I say, “Actually, I may see if I can get a job as a counselor at this summer camp I used to go to . . .”
Hmm, I don’t know where that came from. I mainly said it so I wouldn’t have to explain to my friends why I didn’t want to go for the internship, but there could be something to this idea.
“Oh, that’s fun. What kind of camp is it?” Kelsey asks. “I used to love theater camp.”
“Well, it’s like, um, a Deaf camp,” I say, nervous about how my friends will react.
“Death camp?” Riley blurts out.
“No . . .” I say, grazing my fingers along the side of my head to reveal one of my purple hearing aids. “Deaf.”
“I always forget you have those,” Riley says. “Like, you don’t sound deaf. You know what I mean? Have you seen”—she gestures to the side of her head, and I already know what she’s going to say—“one of the head things that, like, fixes your hearing? Why don’t you get that?”
“A cochlear implant? No.” I don’t have the energy to explain further. “That’s not exactly how that works.”
“That’ll be fun, though,” Kelsey interjects, probably sensing my irritation with Riley’s response. “It’d be amazing to spend the whole summer outside. Promise me you’ll have a summer romance.”
“I don’t know about that . . .” I say, amused by the possibility.
“We’ll miss you all summer,” Riley says. “We’ll have to do some major catching up when ——。”
I don’t catch the rest but get the gist. Sure, I’ll miss the pool parties and sleepovers. Having to jump through hoops to feel included? Yeah, I won’t miss that. Going back to Gray Wolf would be an easier time, at least in terms of accessibility.
My friends turn the music back up and we drive off. I’m left staring out the window . . . again.
I watch the trees as we go by, still wondering where this counselor idea came from but growing more confident about it by the minute. I have been wanting to practice my ASL. And getting away from my family for a bit might be nice, especially since my mom thinks I should study over break to get my grades back on track next year.
But will it be weird going back to Gray Wolf after all this time? It’s a pretty small camp. Will anyone there remember me? My counselors all seemed so much older and cooler, though they were probably around my current age.