Coliver prompt ficlet: Deaf!Oliver. (Thank you Nonny! Hope you enjoy! xoxo)“So, he’s deaf, huh?” Asher says to Connor, shouting a little to be heard over the din of the bar. He scratches at the label on his beer bottle, watching as Oliver and Michaela navigate the crowd on their way over to the bar to get them all another round. “That must really – I mean – it’s hard, right? It’s gotta be hard. Like hard hard.”
When Connor merely quirks a brow and lifts his glass for a slow sip, Asher rushes on to explain.
“Like, don’t get me wrong, he’s amazing. Really. Just an amazing guy. Much too good for you.” Asher coughs and shifts in is chair; trying to at least find a comfortable way to sit while he digs himself out of the hole. “But like, talking and conversations and all that relationship shit. All that’s gotta be hard, right?”
Connor considers as he takes another sip of his drink. His eyes flick to Oliver and Michaela, now at the bar with both their heads bent over a drink menu. Even from across the way, he can see Oliver pull a face at some option then nudge Michaela lightly on the arm. Her attention is drawn to whatever drink Oliver is pointing at on the menu and she pulls a similar face before looking up. A beat passes between the pair of them – Connor imagines Oliver’s eyes are twinkling with mischief like they tend to – before they’re grinning wildly, nodding emphatically, and turning to flag down a bartender. Even from across the bar, Connor gets caught up in their shared amusement and grins.
Connor knows what Asher’s really asking and it’s not how Connor and Oliver communicate. Asher doesn’t want to hear about Connor and Oliver’s misadventures in writing everything down during the first few weeks or the thousands of texts they sent each other from across tables in restaurants or sitting next to each other on couches. He’s not looking for an explanation of their weird, bastardized mix of Connor’s broken sign language and Oliver’s superhuman lip reading skills that wouldn’t make sense to anyone else but helps them get through the day.
No, Asher doesn’t want to hear any of that. What Asher really wants to know is how does it work. How does it really work.
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