by Elle Casey
He left without another word.
* * *
Cammy had stopped asking Momma where Daddy was after the first week. It only made her cry. But Daddy had been gone a long time. Cammy wanted to know where he was, and now Momma sat crying on the sofa again, which made him miserable. “It’s okay, baby, I just miss him,” she said.
Cammy folded himself over her knees and put his head in her lap, his arms encircling her hips. “When’s he coming home?”
Momma stroked his hair. “In a while, I hope. He’s on a long trip.”
A postcard arrived. Momma read it to him. It said I miss you, and that was all. It had a picture on it of the mountain they could see from their balcony.
Letters started to come. Momma said Daddy had always been old-fashioned and romantic. He liked to write things by hand. Before he left, he’d started teaching Cammy to write his letters. It was like coloring, a little, but instead of drawing animals or houses he was drawing sounds, Daddy had said.
Momma said she couldn’t read Daddy’s letters to him—they were private—but that Daddy said he missed Cammy, too, and that he loved them.
“When are they gonna let him come home?” said Cammy, who had only the vaguest idea where his father worked or what he did when he was there.
Momma picked through the pile of letters in her hand. “Maybe soon, baby. I don’t know.”
He returned when Campbell went into surgery a month later. He dropped his duffel bag at her feet in the clinic waiting room. “I thought this wasn’t what you wanted,” said Hayley.
“My family is what I want—you and Campbell,” said Tom. “It’s all I wanted. It’s all I’ll ever want. I love you, I love you so, so much. Please forgive me. Let me come back. Please. I can’t do it without you, Hayley, I can’t…” His cheeks were wet. He held out his arms.
Hayley took in his carefully shaved face, the attention to his clothing—all the things he’d done to please and impress her—and she stepped into the circle of his arms, tentative at first, but with more and more conviction as he held her close. He smelled of clean laundry, and the aftershave she knew he’d painstakingly chosen mingled with the ozone of the hospital’s disinfectant fields. She lifted her head and kissed him, then burrowed back into his arms, relieved and conflicted, angry and elated. They rocked as if they were comforting their son, not each other.
Tom pulled away to kiss her again and look into her face. “Is he okay? Is he scared?”
“Mostly confused,” said Hayley. “The anesthesiologist was so sweet. She talked to him in Spanish and English—can you believe it? She knows two spoken languages. I don’t understand how anyone does that. He was fascinated. I don’t think he’s ever heard another language. By the time I left he was so sleepy he didn’t even notice I was gone.”
Nearby, another couple was silently watching an untranslated projection, some sort of political show. They swiveled their heads toward Tom and Hayley, and frowned.
“Don’t need to read thoughts to know what they’re thinking,” said Tom. He took his duffel in one hand and her elbow in the other, and guided her to the overstuffed, golden beige sofa in the farthest corner from the other couple. “How long will he be in surgery?”
Hayley glanced at the clock. “He’s been in there for two hours. Another hour or so. Dr. Liu will come out and tell us how he did.”
“You look tired,” he said.
She closed her scratchy eyes and let herself sink into the pillowy sofa. “I am exhausted. It’s hard being a single parent.”
“C’mere.” Tom pulled her against his side, and she rested her head against his shoulder. “Did you miss me? I mean, for more than just the parenting part.”
Hayley chuckled and gulped down a sob. “Tom, this was the longest we’ve been apart since the day we met.”
“I know.” He kissed the top of her head and rested his chin there. “Do you forgive me?”
“I’m thinking about it.”
“Promise me something.”
“What?” Tom paused long enough that Hayley pulled away from him; his chest was rising and falling in minute, rapid breaths. “What?”
“You made this decision. Okay.”
“Oh, for God’s sake, Tom, if you’re trying to make up, this isn’t—”
“Let me finish. You made this decision. If I’m going to live with you—and believe me, I can’t live without you—I’m going to have to accept that. I’m working really hard at it. You need to give me—” He cleared his throat and blinked. “When they turn the device on, I might have to go away for a bit. I’m never going to leave you again until the day I die. I won’t even threaten it. I was stupid to have done it. But… I might need some time. Promise me if I do that you’ll let me come home when I’m done. I just—I might need time to think.”
* * *
Two months later, Cammy’s family returned to the Butler Clinic. His parents had cut his hair to match the new growth behind his ear, short but still long enough that he could push it forward and back in that way that hurt and felt good at the same time.
The spot where Dr. Liu had put something Momma called an implant had healed. Daddy asked if it hurt, but Cammy said no. Once in a while, he’d run his fingers over the scar beneath his hair. It itched sometimes, but it didn’t hurt.
Momma said the implant would make him more like other people, the ones who didn’t speak. She said most people could talk to each other in their heads, without speaking. She said when the doctor turned the implant on, he’d be able to, too. Cammy didn’t know what that would be like, and Momma and Daddy couldn’t tell him because they’d never done it.
Andrea said it was sorta like hearing people speak, but better. You could understand everything they said. You wouldn’t need to know the big words Cammy’s parents sometimes used. You could even understand people from other places, like Dr. Liu.
And they could never, ever lie to you.
Andrea was there to tell him what Dr. Liu and James were saying in their heads, and to help Dr. Liu understand them. Andrea said Dr. Liu didn’t speak how Cammy spoke—she knew a different language, like Dr. Chavez, except Dr. Chavez spoke hers aloud and Dr. Liu didn’t. Besides, it was faster for all the thoughtful people when Andrea translated; they didn’t always understand the words Momma and Daddy used, and Andrea did.
“Campbell,” said Andrea, “I’m going to tell you what Dr. Liu is saying, okay? Pretend I’m Dr. Liu now. We’re going to turn on your new implant. It’ll just be for a little bit, but we’ll do it for longer every time you come in to play with James and Andrea, and they’ll teach you how to turn it off and on again yourself, with your mind. This time your head might feel a little funny. You might hear thoughts, and you might not—that’ll be something you work on with James and Andrea. No one will hear what you’re thinking unless you let them, and that’ll be something for playtime, too. You tell us if it hurts, and we’ll turn it off again.” Dr. Liu turned toward Momma and Daddy; the doctor’s smile was smaller, but bigger, like more was stuffed into it than in a regular smile.
He looked at Momma. He could tell she was trying to smile but she was scared. Daddy wasn’t smiling at all.
Cammy wanted to climb into Daddy’s lap and be with him. He’d been sitting in Daddy’s lap a lot since he’d come back home from his trip. Daddy seemed to need it more than Momma.
“Are you ready, Campbell?” said Andrea. “Okay? Here we go.” Dr. Liu pressed her finger on a colored square on the desk.
Cammy shuddered, trying to make sense of the tingling all along the back of his head. It was like big ants were marching from one ear to the other. It was like the sides of his head had fallen off, and his brain was open to the world.
Cammy looked at Dr. Liu. Her lips weren’t moving, but he sensed a fuzzy voice from her direction, like he was in the pool with his head underwater. He squinted at her. “Do you hear me, Campbell?” he made out.
Cammy clapped his hands to his head, full of fear and excitement.
He nodded. Momma burst into tears. Daddy sat very straight, like a wooden toy.
Cammy could always sort of tell what people were feeling. Momma said other people could tell each other how they were feeling with their thoughts, but that Cammy could tell how people felt by the way they sat, things like that. She called it body language. Right now, Daddy’s body language screamed that he was scared, more scared than Cammy was.
Cammy slid off his chair and climbed into Daddy’s lap. Daddy pulled him close and squeezed him. A sob came from deep in Daddy’s chest; it thrummed against Cammy’s cheek. He knew exactly how his father felt. He was scared about Momma. He was sad, so sad, and so, so scared. This time, Cammy wasn’t guessing by the way Daddy looked.
The ants stomped around the back of his head. He cuddled against Daddy, confused and scared himself, and Daddy cried harder. Thoughts came through the buzzing; it was easier this time to hear than Dr. Liu’s had been, maybe because the person talking was closer. “Don’t tell Momma, baby,” Daddy’s voice buzzed in his brain. “Please. Don’t tell her. Squeeze my arm if you understand.”
Cammy looked at Momma; she was crying and smiling. He was so confused. He felt like he should always tell Momma secrets, but this one felt too big to tell. “Are you okay, sweetheart?” she said.
Cammy squeezed his father’s arm, slipped off his lap, and ran to his mother. “I’m okay. Turn it off now, Momma. Turn it off.”
A Word from MeiLin Miranda
I had some fun with the names in this story: Dr. Liu, Dr. Woods, Dr. Chavez, Keisha, Andrea, and James are all named after longtime readers.
I’m always interested in the outsider perspective, so when a chance to write about telepathy came up, I knew I’d either write about a telepath in a non-telepathic world or vice versa. Being shut out of a communication method interested me more than having an ability others didn’t. Perhaps I empathize more with underdogs than special snowflakes.
As I researched parallels in our world, I considered the controversy over cochlear implants in the deaf community. On the surface, it seems obvious a deaf person would want to hear. But it’s far more complex than that, for cultural and technical reasons. What would those reasons look like in a world where telepathy was killing off spoken language, and a new technology began “killing off” the remaining few who spoke aloud? How would that community, the “word-bound,” react?
Campbell’s world is a lot bigger in my head than what’s on the page. Sign up for my mailing list to find out when I revisit “Word-Bound” (you’ll also get a free, exclusive ebook as a thank you), and check out my website for information on my other books and short stories.
A Note to Readers
Thank you so much for reading The Telepath Chronicles. If you enjoyed these stories, please keep an eye out for other titles in the Future Chronicles collection. The Robot Chronicles is currently available, and The Alien Chronicles will be available in late 2014. You might also enjoy other science fiction anthologies edited by David Gatewood, including Synchronic: 13 Tales of Time Travel.
And before you go, could we ask of you a very small favor?
Would you write a short review at the site where you purchased the book?
Reviews are make-or-break for authors. A book with no reviews is, simply put, a book with no future sales. This is because a review is more than just a message to other potential buyers: it’s also a key factor driving the book’s visibility in the first place. More reviews (and more positive reviews) make a book more likely to be featured in bookseller lists (such as Amazon’s “also viewed” and “also bought” lists) and more likely to be featured in bookseller promotions. Reviews don’t need to be long or eloquent; a single sentence is all it takes. In today’s publishing world, the success (or failure) of a book is truly in the reader’s hands.
So please, write a review. Tell a friend. Share us on Facebook. Maybe even write a Tweet (140 characters is all we ask). You’d be doing us a great service.
Thank you.
