Disclaimer: I do not own Switched At Birth. Love the show though!
Chapter 1:
It was a nice sunny day; perfect for a friendly game of baseball or basketball but a certain Bay Kennish would look at the window on a day like this and still prefer to go to her garage-turned-art studio. She changed into her work clothes and headed to the kitchen for breakfast. She brushed off the rest of her family's questions about the baseball game they were hosting this evening. She looked up from her cereal bowl to see Daphne and her Dad talking animatedly to each other. They eyes shined exactly the same way. "How could we have not seen it?" She thinks to herself.
Bay and Daphne were two sixteen year olds who were switched at birth, but no one seemed to realize it till Bay had taken a DNA test in school, only to find out the family she had lived with for all those years were not her biological family. Many phone calls, tears and conversations later they tracked Daphne's family and explained the whole scenario. Daphne, her mom and her grandmother who lived in a poor area of the Eastside decided to stay in Bay's pool house so they could to know each other... which is how Bay found herself staring at both father and daughter; both athletic and bright in contrast to her creative and broody nature. And to think, a year ago my biggest issue was Liam. She snorted at the thought of her ex-boyfriend and earned a series of confused and concerned looks.
"What's up with you?" Toby looked at her, wriggling his eyes in question.
"Isn't there always something wrong with me, Toby?" she asked back, a sarcastic smile plastered to her face.
To this, everyone rolled their eyes and continued doing whatever they were doing. Typical, dramatic Bay.
"So I guess you're not coming to the game? It'll be loads of fun!" Daphne said, trying her best to sound cheerful but Bay looked her straight in the eye. "Come on Daph. We both know baseball's not for me."
She didn't mean to sound rude, but sometimes her honesty and bluntness scared people away... not that she'd care though. She saw Daphne's face and almost felt guilty, but Daphne smiled at her with understanding and she knew everything was alright.
She caught Daphne sigh in relief when she thought Bay had looked away, and automatically an eyebrow rose in confusion to why she reacted this way but a few moments later she let it go. After everything they've been through, she didn't want to start a fight.
She and Daphne didn't get along so well after they found out about the switch. Bay came from a rich Southern family, with a celebrity father and a party-host mother. Everything came easy for her and she was spoiled. Daphne; on the other hand, wasn't. She caught meningitis at the age of three and as a result was deaf. She was smart, athletic (something she gets from her dad) and kind. She could read lips though and uses sign language to communicate. This was an issue in the beginning because the Kennish family didn't have any idea how to sign and knew nothing about deaf culture. It's been a long year though, and they've picked it up well.
Bay said goodbye to everybody and headed for her studio. It was her favourite place in house and she'd stay and work there for hours. She looked at her row of recent canvases. Her "break-up" phase she'd like to call it. All the canvases had dark colours and sometimes it had a faint shadow of a bike in the background but it was so faint next to a blazing fire she painted over it.
Again and again, she'd find herself painting the same shapes. The same shadowy images that have been haunting her mind since that night at the Carlton Prom.
She had gone through breakups before; but this was different. She had been in love this time.
He was Emmett. He had reddish blonde hair that stood up in all directions when he removed his helmet. Emmett was so different from everyone she had ever dated. First off, he was completely deaf. His fingers danced around like magic when he signed. He was so quick that Bay struggled a few times to understand. They were from two completely different worlds. He had never tried to speak before he met her and she never bothered with ASL, but once they started seeing each other, they decided to meet each other halfway.
Bay's pretty good in ASL now and he's going for speech therapy. He used to anyway. They broke up last summer and stopped talking, so she didn't know about him anymore.
She took a deep breath and sat down. She remembered how when they first started going out. No one really understood it. They hadn't thought it would last. They couldn't see how Bay watched his eyes more than his fingers. They saw right through each other. She felt her eyes sting as she remembered how rocky their relationship became after those first beautiful glossy moments. His parents wanted a divorce and she somehow ended up smack in the middle of that chaos. He told her specifically that he didn't want her to get involved in it, and yet without even trying tryingto ; Bay was in it and... it wasn't a pretty sight. He was so mad at her and their abrupt conversation ended with him looking furious.
She had wondered how out of the blue, when he visited her the next day, he had told her he wanted to forget everything. How could she have been so blind?
He had cheated on her with someone he barely knew. Someone she knew all too well. Simone. She and Bay weren't on speaking terms and of all the people, he had to cheat with Simone.
That wasn't even the worst part.
The worst part was how he hid it from her. He walked in the next day like he couldn't remember the horrible night before and told her he wanted to forget it all. That he didn't want to lose her.
Bullshit. She could feel the anger boiling up from the sorrow in her heart.
He had made her look so stupid. There she was; running around, trying to fix him the best birthday she possibly could. She even introduced them both. She had laughed with him. Talked to him... and he had lied to her face pretending to be the best boyfriend ever after the whole 'forgive and forget' scenario.
She got up and opened her red paint tube with such ferocity that a bit of the red goo fell to the floor but she didn't care. She covered the top half of a blank canvas with big angry strokes. She kept doing it; layer over layer as if ever stroke was somehow calming her, till she felt exhausted. She finally closed the red tube and walked to the kitchen to pour herself some lemonade. She walked about the house and looked at the picture frames hung tastefully on the wall; pictures of her and Toby and how close they were. He had been pretty upset too (he had been dating Simone but they weren't so serious), but he had bounced back fairly quicker than Bay did… hell, she was still wallowing in self-pity for goodness sake.
Toby handled it differently. He was angry and he wanted to make Simone regret what she did. He took out a lot of girls, just to throw it in her face. Pretty harsh but somehow Bay felt he was doing it for the both of them… because he wanted her to feel bad since she hurt his baby sister. Toby's always looked out for her, he wouldn't just stop now. She felt like she should've gone to the baseball game after all, cheering for her family. Forgetting that sorry event.
She put on a short black dress with her favourite stockings and boots and jumped into her car. She rushed to the park and walked in casually to where her family always sat. She rolled her eyes when she spotted the crazy looking crowd of that were her family dressed in the same shade. So. Predictable. She loved them all though, so she swallowed up the embarrassment and walked to them. They were all glad to see her... all except Daphne. She looked at Bay in shock.
"Bay… you... you came. Great" but Daphne had always been horrible at lying.
Okay. What's she up to this time?
She sat next to Daphne and whispered so only she could hear.
"What's up? I know you don't like me but I mean seriousl-"
"No. Bay. It's not like that... I was just..." She broke off looking around frantically.
Bay tried to look at what she was looking at and suddenly stopped short.
She sees Emmett and his mom sitting together drinking soda and eating fries, totally immersed in the game. He looks happy. Real Happy. She felt something break inside.
He signs to his mom about the drink when he looks up and sees her. His fingers stop moving and they both just stare at eachother.
…and just like that; everything freezes.