Page 6 of The Sound Of Us

That’s what I’d wanted of my father’s all my life. His strength of mind. Not easily swayed by the outside world. Quick but careful decision maker. Immune to naysayers who said something couldn’t be done. In a world where my hearing loss could have placed me at a significant disadvantage, it was this strength of mind that ensured I was never underestimated in business. There is power in silence, too.

The light flickers above me and I turn to the door.

My mother enters.

Five-foot-one in heels, silver hair brushed neatly to one side and touching her shoulders, and a smile that made the whole world right, she defies her seventy-nine years in every way possible.

My mother had the spunk and enthusiasm of someone half her age. Not even a surprise baby when she was forty-seven (and my father ten years older) could have deterred her from running Saxon Intel with my father.

Childless, not by choice and educated despite the obstacles, she was everything not expected of a woman. In a time where women were muzzled and ignored, she rose to the uppermost ranks of a male dominated world, standing alongside my father as an equal. She had been magnificent to watch while I was growing up.

And as of seven months ago, she stands alongside me, supporting me as she had done with my father.

“He was always proud of you, Eli,” she signs when she joins me by the framed wall.

“I know,” I sign back.

She faces me, using her voice. “Are you ready?”

I nod.

“The last of the promises made between father and son.” She smiles, rubbing her palms up and down my arms. “He always wanted to go back, but life can run away with you sometimes.”

River Valley, Eastern Kentucky.

My truck had arrived at the airport just outside River Valley about two hours ago, waiting for me. I had already dispatched electricians to the house a week ago to make the house deaf-friendly and a cleaning company has already deep cleaned the place.

A moving truck is already on its way to the tiny town in the middle of nowhere where my father had been born to penniless but humble parents who dreamed big for their only child.

Both had died when he was thirteen years old, and my father had been raised by his aunt alongside his cousin, Alberta, who had lived in River Valley her whole life until she became ill and came to live in a nursing home near us.

My father and I planned last year to go back to his hometown and restore the home he’d grown up in with Alberta, so she, too, could see the restored home where her mother had raised both her and my father.

But things don’t always go as planned. And sometimes, putting things off for a couple of weeks or months can easily turn into a couple of decades without you noticing.

Alberta passed away nearly a year ago, and then, my father, a few months later. She’d had no children of her own, so she left the house to me.

“Have you sent over the piano and the coal stove?” my mother asks.

I sign, “Yes.”

The piano and the coal stove had belonged to my father’s mother. He’d had it moved when he left River Valley, but he often mentioned that the two items belonged in the coal town of River Valley.

“Aren’t you going to go home and change first?” My mother frowns, indicating that she’s not just asking. She’s scolding.

“No need,” I sign. “Everything is on its way. My truck is already waiting for me.”

“Don’t get too lonely over there,” she says, switching from scolding to worrying.

“I’ll bring back a son-in-law for you,” I sign with a grin.

“If I should be so lucky,” she signs back, laughing. Then, with a serious face again, she says, “Travel safe, Eli. I wish I could visit, but I'm getting old and traveling isn't easy for me anymore. Come back home if you finish sooner, okay? Your staff will miss you.”

“And you? You won’t miss me?”

“I’ll miss you the most. Take care of yourself and don’t spend too much time alone. And don’t think too much about things.”

“Okay,” I sign.

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