Welcome Gloria. A woman signed to Abby's mother as they walked into a two story building that reeked of crayons and hand sanitizer.

Hello Sarah, This is Abby. Abby's mother paused to face Abby Abby say hello.

She obeyed immediately and said "Hello" While Signing the same thing unsure of Sarah's capability of hearing.

She Can Talk? Sarah signed to Abby's mother, obviously impressed.

"Well I am four, most four year olds can read. But my mom and dad have never taught me. When can I learn to read? Are there other children here? Well of course there are I can smell them, but when can I go talk to them? Is there anyone who likes to wear their hair in pigtails?" Abby started to ramble.

Sarah, obviously impressed signed to Abby Yes Abby. You can learn to read here. The other children are in there. She pointed to a set of double doors with glass windows.

"Good lets go!" Abby was excited beyond belief.

Sarah led her to the doors followed by Abby's mother. When Sarah opened the door Abby covered her ears. It was so loud!

"Why is it so loud in here?!?!" Abby said screaming to be heard over the commotion.

"You can hear?!?!" Sarah replied shocked.

"Of course I can hear! Why on earth would you think I couldn't hear?" Abby was confused beyond belief.

"Oh dear." Sarah shook her head, took Abby's hand and led her to the office. Gloria following shortly behind.

Gloria, Why didn't you tell me Abby could hear? Sarah signed to Abby's mom.

I assumed you knew! Abby's mother was astonished by the sudden realization that Abby didn't belong here. Abby's mother was a volunteer at the school, she had always assumed Abby would go there.

No I didn't. I'm going to have to send Abby home with you. Public Schools won't take children as young as her.

But Sarah, She's so bright. There has to be somewhere that she can go!

Abby had plopped herself down on the floor and she decided to ignore the conversation going on behind her. It wasn't hard to do considering the conversation was silent. She looked around the office, it was pretty boring, if it weren't for the stack of workbooks on a table, the room would be totally useless to her.

Abby reached for a workbook, picking one out that had numbers on the front. She recognized some things from when her Uncle had been staying with them. Abby didn't understand what was so hard about finding "x" anyway. There was a pattern she had noticed. If you made the x all by it's self you had your answer. And the only way to get x by it's self was to do things to both sides of the equation.

Opening up the book to page 34 she saw a problem that made her laugh

X+3=7

"Easy" Abby mumbled, taking away three from each side. She never figured out the value of these numbers, only that each one was more than the next, and if you knew the order and wrote them out you could add or take away as many as you wanted. Abby continued on with the page, stopping only occasionally to count out the differences between certain numbers.

"Abby?" Sarah asked glancing over at the little girl who was now plopped on her stomach counting something on her fingers. "Abby, what are you doing?"

"I really have no idea. Uncle Robby was doing this when he visited a while ago. It's not really that hard though…."

"Abby… Abby.. Abby! You did every single one of these right! Abby this is incredible!" Sarah couldn't hide her excitement. She signed for Gloria to Stay Put and rushed out of the room.

After what seemed like an hour Sarah reentered the office. "Abby, how would you like to go to Benjamin Franklin Elementary?"

Ben Franklin? That's where David went! She'd learn just as much as him! She would show him how much better she was. "I would love it!" Abby was up off the floor bouncing up and down from excitement.

After Sarah explained the situation to Abby's mother it was off to Ben Franklin. She was to attend The PM Kindergarten session, so there was still time for her to get there for today.

At precisely 12:20 Abby and her mother arrived at Benjamin Franklin Elementary. Ten minutes before class was to start.

"Hello you must be Abby!" A young woman greeted them as they entered the classroom. "My name is Ms. Chalk.".

Abby acknowledged her, "Nice to meet you ma'am." Then She turned to her mother. You can go now. I can do this. After Abby and her mom hugged her mother left.

"Isn't your mother going to ask me anything?" Ms. Chalk was glancing down the hallway at the woman who had only been in her presence for about 2 minutes.

"No. She can't, unless you speak American Sign Language ma'am. She's deaf." Abby said simply.

"Oh okay then. Abby why don't you come in here, and you can sit here next to Rebecca Coy." Ms. Chalk ushered her to a red chair seated next to a little girl wearing a skull tee shirt.

Abby smiled, Rebecca Coy huh, she seems alright. "Hi." Abby said smiling at her use of 'slang'.

"I hate you." The little girl replied.

Abby was taken aback. Not one person had ever told her something so mean. Everyone was always so accepting of her. "Well, I like your shirt."

"DON'T STEAL IT!!!" Rebecca Screamed, genuinely concerned for the well being of her shirt, her least favorite shirt at that.

"I wasn't planning on it…" Abby was confused. But she decided, not out loud, in her head. Rebecca wasn't alright.

"Okay class. Lets get started, today we're going to be painting!" Ms. Chalk said with as much enthusiasm as she could come up with.

"I love painting! Once granny let me paint her fence!" Abby was very excited.

"WELL IF YOU LOVE IT SO MUCH WHY DON'T YOU MARRY IT!" Rebecca shouted in her ear.

Abby really had no response, so she settled for leaning into her chair and listening to Ms. Chalk.

"So what I really want you to do is paint something that reminds you of your house." Ms Chalk finished explaining the activity and started passing out paints.

"I'm going to draw a monster, because I have one of those in my closet!" A little boy named Evan said.

"EW! NO EW!" Rebecca screamed "THERE IS NO SUCH THINGS AS MONSTERS!" Rebecca yelled, trying to convince herself more than anything else.

Abby stayed quiet thinking of what reminded her of home. There's the banister, it's fun to slide down… Or maybe the shed, I like climbing onto it's roof… Then she got it. She knew exactly what to paint. She reached for a jar of red paint and began to work away.

Forty minutes later most of the class was finished painting. Evan and Alex were talking about their monsters they had drawn. Rebecca was complaining about the purple paint Rita had gotten on her shirt. William was chewing on a crayon. Amidst all the chaos you could see Abby. Still working away on her masterpiece, she was determined to give it justice. While she was working away at the fine lettering of her painting Ms. Chalk came over.

"Abby!" She gasped taking in a breath at the wonderful creation in front of her. Abby had painted Wuthering Heights, with the texture of the lettering even captured it was hard not to be taken aback by the work. "Abby where did you learn to pay such fine attention to details?!?"

"I don't. I just look at that book. I've never read it though… What's it called?" Abby was waiting intently for an answer to a question she'd wanted to know for at least a year.

"Wuthering Heights…" Ms. Chalk said under her breath.

"Wuthering Heights." Abby repeated with gusto. "I'm going to read this book. I'm going to read it soon. Because you're going to teach me to read, right?"

"Yes Abby. But you won't be able to read Wuthering Heights for quite some time." Ms. Chalk was still in a daze. She walked over to the phone to make a call.

Abby couldn't hear the conversation, not even Ms. Chalk's end of it. So she tried to read her body language, which becomes much easier when you know sign language. From what she could tell, Ms. Chalk was arranging for her to have someone teach Abby to read.

Ms. Chalk crossed the room back to Abby. Picked up her painting, then took it over to hang up to dry.

"Okay class, go to the coatroom and get your things. We'll be going out to recess in a few minutes.

Abby sat still. What things? All she had were the clothes on her back. The rest of the class scrambled to the coatroom and got things like jackets, and playground equipment. A few had coloring books.

Ms. Chalk announced that they would have 20 minutes outside. Then the class scrambled out the door to the playground, with Abby short on their tail.

The playground was interesting, most of it was unfamiliar to Abby. The only thing she recognized was the swing in the far back corner. But between her and them were a whole disarray of things she had no idea what to do with. She walked over to a game of hopscotch, because it seemed like something Rebecca wouldn't do.

"Hi, what are you doing?" Abby inquired of a group of 4 girls.

"Playing hopscotch… Duh…" One girl with red curls replied.

"Oh, how to you play?" Abby asked.

"You throw this rock, to each number, in a row, then you have to jump the… thingy, with one foot in each square, and then back, except on the square with the rock, that one you only get on the way back. Here let me show you." A girl with long brown hair in a headband replied.

The girl expertly hopped through the entire game, until she came back to the square where she needed to pick up the rock. While bending over she lost her balance.

"So basically you do that, except you pick up the rock, and finish the course."

"That's it? Okay let me try." Abby said. The girls were sure she had to be kidding, hopscotch took practice. There was no way she could do it.

Abby expertly jumped the course, even avoiding a dodgeball being thrown across the playground. "So how'd I do?"

The girls walked away obviously angry. Abby was hurt. All she'd been trying to do was to fit in. And by doing just what she thought she should, she'd made people mad. Rejected Abby went to the sidewalk and sat on the curb.

After another 3 minutes passed, two ants had passed as well as a butterfly. Abby was bored. For the first time in her life she didn't know what to do. There had always been something to do. If it weren't going into town with her daddy in the big old pick-up truck, then she'd stay around the house looking around for things that looked interesting or different.

Abby had never thought she didn't fit in, she always felt like she fit perfectly in her little world. She'd never been in a place where she didn't belong… not until now.

Authors Note: Hey guys! This is my first fanfiction! And I was amazed when I realized you guys were actually reading this! Reviews are like my fuel! If you have any ideas message me!