Chapter 25

Bobby had spent several hours going over Sue's last several meetings with Jordan and came up with nothing new. Both of them were getting extremely frustrated so he suggested they call Donna to bring the kids over.

Realizing she was still in her robe, Sue went to shower and change while Bobby cleaned up. She came back to find him looking through one of Lucy's sign language books from the book shelf. She watched with a smile on her face as he attempted a few signs by copying what it looked like in the pictures.

"Actually that sign is directional," she said, laughing slightly when he snapped the book shut and spun around. He looked like a kid that had been caught with his hand in the cookie jar.

"Huh? What?" he stammered.

"Payback," she smiled, reminding Bobby that he'd startled her earlier. He grinned back, putting the book back on the shelf.

"Directional," he asked, realizing what she'd said. "What's that?"

"It means the sign moves in the direction that the action is taking," she explained. Seeing he still had a confused look on his face, Sue held out her left hand flat palm up and placed her right fist into it with the thumb up. "This was the sign that you were doing, right?"

"Yeah," Bobby said copying the sign as she did it. "It said it was the sign for HELP."

"That's right," she nodded. "But if you move your hands toward you, that's 'HELP-ME'." She should him what she meant proud when he followed. "If you push your hands away it means 'I-HELP' or sometimes could be 'HELP-YOU'."

"Wow," he practiced a few times saying the words in his head as he moved his hands. "Can you do this with all words?"

"Not all," Sue smiled. "But a lot of action words are directional." Holding two hands out as if she was driving a car, she said, "DRIVE." Adding the motions, she continued, "I-DRIVE…YOU-DRIVE."

Assuming the position she demonstrated, Bobby duplicated her actions pleased when he was rewarded with a smile. He'd hoped to get her mind off things and this was just the ticket. She seemed much more relaxed showing him signs and they could do this until Donna showed up with the kids. I wanted to learn more and now is as good a time as any, Bobby thought.

"So how long before I'm as good as Jack and Lucy," he joked, trying to keep the mood light.

"Well," Sue wanted to be honest. "They've been signing for a couple of years now, and they come to Deaf functions with me so they get exposure to it quite often," she admitted, walking to the sofa to sit down. "The easiest way to learn is to be around as many deaf people as you can and talk to them. It's the deaf language so the best way is to let them teach you, not books." She added, pointing to the bookcase. "The more you are around people using sign, the quicker you'll pick it up."

"Is that why Lucy is better than Jack?" Bobby asked, sitting beside her. "Because she lives her with you and gets to use it all the time." Bobby was happy he'd gotten this opportunity to ask these questions. He'd always wanted to, but it had never been easy. Sue, on the other hand, made him very comfortable asking questions. She didn't mind answering any of them and correcting him on some of his misconceptions.

"Well, it could be," Sue started. "It could also be that since Jack started signing when he was older it's just taking his hands a little while to get used to the movement." At Bobby's curious look, she grabbed his hand and held it up to hers. "See your hand is bigger than mine and, for some men, it means they can't move it as easily for the quick small motions we make in some signs and fingerspelling." Bobby nodded his understanding. "I'm not saying he won't be as good as Lucy some day, but Jack just doesn't have the small motor movement built up yet."

"That's why Troy can sign so fast," Bobby concluded. "He's been doing it all his life so his hands are used to the movement."

"It's Troy's first language," Sue smiled. "Just like you can talk so fast because it's yours."

"Sorry," Bobby apologized. He knew he did forget sometimes, and when he got excited, he'd talk even faster than he normally did. He knew that had to be frustrating for Sue. He made a mental note for himself to start working on that harder.

"Okay, tell me more," Bobby said, hungry to learn.

"How about I show you?" Sue said as she started to sign, Bobby watching her hands diligently and listening to her every word.