Sue sat at the table in the kitchen, stirring a spoon in her cup of tea. She hadn't bothered drinking any of it; she was too busy thinking about the dance. It was probably cold now, anyway. They had the afternoon off from school, since the dance was that evening - it was 4pm and Jack still hadn't even asked her yet. She sighed wistfully, wondering if she would be going when Pepper jumped up and rested her front paws on Sue's knee, barking.

"What is it, girl?"

Pepper barked again and raced out of the kitchen, down the hall. Stopping in front of the door, she looked up at Sue and barked again. Sue smiled proudly; this was the first time Pepper had alerted her to any sounds. She knelt to rub the dog's head before opening the door.

"Jack... what are you doing here?"

"I ... uh... was wondering if you wanted to go to the dance?"

"Cutting it a bit short are you not?" She glared at him, but she had a playful sparkle in her eye.

"Err... well, I wasn't sure if you'd wanna go... not hearing the music and that." He told her truthfully.

"Well... I don't know... it's kinda short notice..." She frowned, then watching Jack's face fall slightly, she smiled, "but I guess I should take the chance to wear that dress I bought."

"Great!" He replied, suddenly feeling very nervous, handing her a small posy of white and red roses.

"Thanks - just let me go and change!" And with that, she ran off in the direction of her bedroom.

In her room, Sue laid out her dress on the bed and plugged in a set of curling irons. Her heart was pounding with excitement and she could feel butterflies in her stomach. After just over an hour, she left her room, and went back to the hallway where Jack was still standing, looking at the photos of her family along the wall. She cleared her throat to get his attention. He turned around to face her and the look on his face said it all. His jaw dropped.

"Trying to catch flies, or something, Jack?" She teased.

He closed his mouth quickly, then opened it again to speak.

"That was quick... for a girl."

"Funny." She said sarcastically after slapping him on the arm, "So ... what do you think?" She then asked, twirling around.

"Wow!" He managed to breathe out, then he signed "You look beautiful!"

She looked at him with questioning eyes, and an amused expression on her face. Jack shrugged and told her,

"Helen said you'd been teaching the gang ASL so I asked her to teach me some..."

"I'm impressed!" She replied, smiling.

"Well, our chariot awaits, M'lady." He informed her with a smile.

He held out an arm, which she gladly took and led her outside. To where two black limousines were waiting. Being that a limousine only held about 8 people, they'd needed two to fit the whole gang. Amy and David Thomas, Helen and James, Lucy and Bobby and Sue and Jack shared one, while Erin and David Williams, Nikki and Jake and Tara and Kyle were in the other.

When they arrived at the school assembly hall, they quickly found seats at the table that the girls had reserved for their group. Sitting down next to Jack, it was obvious that Sue was nervous. He gave her hand a gentle squeeze to reassure her and she smiled weakly. The girls soon fell into a conversation about how good the hall looked, and how well it seemed to be going. Already, couples could be seen dancing together in the middle of the floor. Instead of a band, like you'd normally see in an American teen movie, the girls had decided that they'd recruit certain students from the school to sing. When they first arrived a girl was singing Because You Loved Me. Then it was a group of boys who performed Bon Jovi hits. Sue and Jack sat alone at their table, talking instead of dancing since Jack still wasn't sure about whether she'd want to. Their last song, Bed of Roses, had started playing when Sue asked Jack to dance.

There were hundreds of couples on the floor for that song, including all of Sue's friends, but everyone in the room seemed to fade around them as Jack lip-synced the words to her.

"When you close your eyes
Know I'll be thinking about you
While my mistress she calls me
To stand in her spotlight again
Tonight I won't be alone
But you know that don't
Mean i'm not lonely I've got nothing to prove
For it's you that I'd die to defend

I want to lay you down on a bed of roses
For tonight I sleep on a bed on nails
I want to be just as close as the holy ghost is
And lay you down on bed of roses."

The song came to an end but he still held her in the middle of the room, oblivious to the couples around them, and mouthed,

"Sue, I think I'm falling in love with you."

But instead of the happy reception he'd hoped for, she turned on her heels and ran from the room. Amy, Lucy and Helen looked as though they wanted to go after her but he told them not to and he too ran out of the room, to find Sue.

He found her after about fifteen minutes of walking round the whole school building. She was at the girls' usual break time haunt - the statue of the Virgin Mary - crying.

"What's wrong?" Jack questioned, concerned.

"It's nothing really..."

"You can't be crying over nothing." He pressed, putting a protective arm around her shoulders.

"You know ... Helen told me about you watching TV with the sound muted, wearing earplugs..." She told him, smiling ever so slightly. "it's just that, back home none of the kids ever bothered to even try to understand what it's like to be deaf. Now though, I actually have real friends. Friends who want to understand and learn. Sure I've got a few enemies too..." Jack chuckled, remembering the fight between Amy and Carly. "But, for the first time in my life people are listening to what I think and ... I'm not so much of an outcast anymore and ... I've finally found someone I love who loves me back and ..."She paused, taking a deep breath before she continued. "Well I'm scared I'll lose all that when we go back to America."

"You're going back? When?"

"Dad said this morning that we'd be home by the end of December."

"Isn't there something you can do?"

"He only moved us here so he could set up a new branch of the business, and now it's up and running he doesn't feel any need to stay."

Jack couldn't find the right words to convey his feelings at that moment, so he just held her.