Disclaimer: I own nothing of CSI
A New Friend
"Sloan, dinner is ready, I made pancakes and sausages." Jackie told the little boy as she poked her head into his room.
"Ok." He said, sounding sad, which was weird because he loved it when the family had breakfast for dinner, as did Jackie when she was little, which is why she carried on the tradition with her own kids.
"What's wrong buddy?" Jackie asked him as she sat down next to him on the bed.
"There is a new kid in my class named James and he made me sad."
"What did he do that made you sad, kiddo?" Jackie asked him.
"I asked him if he wanted to play with me and he went like this and walked away." Sloan said as he looked away from her.
"You asked him to play with you at recess and he ignored you and just walked away?" Jackie asked him just to make sure she understood.
"Yeah." He confirmed.
"I'm sorry, I understand why that would hurt your feelings. Sometimes we hurt peoples' feelings without meaning to, maybe he is just shy, or maybe he was really nervous. Do you remember the day you started kindergarten and you lots of butterflies in your tummy?"
"Yeah, lots, but I didn't have butterflies this year because I'm in first grade now." He said proudly.
Jackie smiled at him.
"You would have butterflies in your tummy if you had to go to a brand new school, though, huh?" She asked.
"Yeah, I don't want to go to a new school, I love my school and I love Mrs. Anderson."
Jackie laughed, that didn't surprise her, all of the students loved Sue Anderson.
"Maybe James loved his old school too and he was sad he had to go to a new one, but I am very proud of you that you were trying to be a good friend to James and play with him at recess, that is a very kind thing to do, and daddy will be super proud of you too." She told him as she wrapped her arms around him.
Sloan beamed at the praise.
"And I'll bet that James didn't mean to hurt your feelings and after a few days he probably won't be so scared anymore and maybe then he'll want to play with you at recess, what do you think?"
"Yeah!" Sloan answered happily.
"What do you say we go eat our pancakes and sausages now so they don't get cold?" Jackie asked.
"Ok, I love pancakes!"
"Me too." Jackie agreed.
The next day at work Jackie was walking to her classroom. "Hey Jackie, come here a minute." Sue called to her.
"Ok, just a second, let me put my stuff down in my classroom and then I'll come on over." Jackie told her.
Jackie put her purse and iced coffee on the back table in her classroom and then walked the short distance to Sue's room.
"Here, this is for you." Sue said as she handed her a gift card to her favorite coffee shop.
"What's this for?" Jackie asked perplexed.
"Because you took my morning duty on Monday so I could call one of my student's parents remember?"
"Oh for crying out loud, I'm not taking that, you've taken my morning duty, and recess duty, and my lunch duty more times than I can count."
"We don't have lunch duty." Sue told her.
"Ok, we don't, but if we did I'm sure you'd take it." Jackie argued as she put the gift card on Sue's back table.
"Take it, it's only $5, it's not even enough for an entire coffee."
"I don't care if it's a quarter, I'm not taking it."
Sue sighed.
"You are so stubborn." She told her good friend.
Jackie raised her eyebrows, one of them was incredibly stubborn but Jackie didn't think it was her.
Lisa Masters sat in the neighboring classroom chuckling at the two of them, they always argued about things like this and it was hilarious, usually Sue won the argument but this time it looked like Jackie had.
"While you are in here, come here." She motioned for her to come to the corner of the classroom.
"Why, are you going to try to give me free tickets to cirque de soleil for taking your recess duty on this date 2 years ago?" Jackie asked with a smirk.
"No, I'm not, I want to show you something."
Jackie walked over to her.
"That's cute, where did you find that?" Jackie asked as she looked at the new "job chart" holder for her students that was hanging up on the wall.
"Online, I sent you an email about it yesterday after school."
"Ok, thanks, I have to check my email."
"Yeah, you should it wasn't that hard to make, either."
"I like that it's color coded, the kids will like that as well." Jackie told her.
"Yeah, oops, I have to make sure I plugged in my microphone so it will charge, I think I did it already but I better make sure." Sue said as she hustled to an area behind her desk, leaving Jackie to further observe the job chart.
"Microphone?" Jackie asked.
"Yep, I have a new student who is hard of hearing and he has a hearing device that connects to a microphone that I use so he is able to hear me, it's really cool what technology can do."
Jackie's eyes got wide.
"Sue, is your new student's name James?"
"Yep."
"So that's what happened, the sweet little guy wasn't ignoring Sloan, he didn't hear him."
"What?" Sue asked.
Jackie explained what Sloan had told her last night.
"Oh, I'm so sorry Sloan got his feelings hurt, I tried my best to explain to the kids that James is hard of hearing but they are so young so it's hard for them to understand, I'll talk to the class again today. I'm proud of Sloan for being so kind though, and James really does seem like a total sweetheart."
"I am proud of Sloan too, and yes, I'm sure he is, I'll encourage Sloan to keep trying to be his friend." Jackie promised.
"Here, these are coming home with the kids today but since you're here I'll give it to you now. It's a sheet explaining that there is a class where you learn basic sign language, it's a six-week class so you obviously won't learn everything but you'll definitely learn some things. It's free to educators and kids under 18, I'm taking it, I'm hoping some other teachers will too as well as some of my students with their parents."
"I'll talk to Sloan and see if he wants to, this might be a great way for him to be able to better communicate with James, and it will give me a chance to spend some one on one time with him." Jackie said eagerly.
"That'd be great, it's only once a week for an hour."
"Thanks Sue, for now though I better go back to my classroom, I still have a couple things to get done before the kids come in for the day."
When the students arrived that morning Sue tried her best to again explain James' hearing loss to the class in a way that they understood.
The kids seemed to understand.
At morning recess Sue was on duty when suddenly Sue heard yelling. She turned and saw Sloan yelling at James. Sue nearly fell over, that was so not like Sloan, he was such a sweetheart to everyone. Jackie was a very loving and patient teacher, and mother, but the one thing that she did not tolerate under any circumstance from her students or her own children was for them to be mean or unkind, Sue knew that if Jackie found out about this Jackie and Sloan would be having a conversation and there would be consequences for Sloan's behavior.
Sue hustled over to the two little boys.
"Sloan, why are you yelling at James?" Sue asked.
"I'm not yelling at him Mrs. Anderson, you said he couldn't hear us so I'm talking loud so he can hear me." Sloan explained innocently.
Sue was relieved, that sounded much more like the Sloan she knew and loved and although Sloan's method of communication wasn't going to work it made total sense that a small child would think that that was a good solution.
"Sweetheart, I know that sounds like that will work but talking louder to him won't help, that's why I wear this microphone so he can hear me." She explained as she pointed at her microphone.
"Can I wear one too Mrs. Anderson, so he can hear me too?" Sloan asked.
She smiled at him.
"I wish we had microphones for everyone, but we don't, I'm sorry, but what is it that you want to tell him, maybe I can help?" She asked.
"I want to ask him if he wants to go on the swings with me."
Sue thought for a minute.
"Ok, let's try this, watch me." She told the little boy.
She very gently tapped James on the shoulder and then motioned for him to follow her, both Sloan and James followed her as she walked towards the swings.
Sloan got on one and Mrs. Anderson looked at James and smiled as she pointed at the other. James smiled as he happily crawled on the swing.
Sue turned as she heard a whistle, the kindergarteners were lining up meaning there was no longer going to be another teacher outside besides her to help her watch all the kids.
"Ok guys, I have to watch all the kids now so I have to go to my spot on the playground but if you boys need anything you let me know, ok?"
"Ok, thank you Mrs. Anderson." Sloan said.
"You're welcome." She replied with a smile before she walked away.
Awhile later Sloan and James grew tired of the swings, the slide was fun, it was a twisty slide, Sloan loved that slide and Sloan wanted his new friend to go with him. He remembered what Mrs. Anderson told him about talking loud, it wouldn't work, then he remembered how she'd showed him to tap him gently on the shoulder. He did and then motioned for James to follow him, just like Mrs. Anderson had, it worked, James happily followed him to the slide.
They each got to take two turns on the slide then Mrs. Anderson blew her whistle meaning that recess was over and that they had to go line up. Normally Sloan would be sad that recess was over but his class had music right after recess today so he was excited, he loved music.
On the way back to their classroom from music class they passed Jackie's class who was just going to music. Sloan waved happily but not at Jackie, he was waving to the beloved school secretary, Mrs. Caldwell instead. I went through hours of painful labor and an excruciating delivery without pain meds, and I don't even get a wave. Jackie thought amusedly to herself as she watched the little boy, oh well, Jackie knew that Mrs. Caldwell was by far all the student's favorite person in the school.
After music was snack time and then after the kids were done with their snack Mrs. Anderson passed out a color by numbers math worksheet. Sloan looked over next to him, James had a really cool blue crayon that he wanted to borrow, but James wouldn't be able to hear him if he asked to borrow it and his mommy always said that he shouldn't borrow something from someone without asking first. He thought about what to do and when he couldn't figure out a solution he raised his hand.
Mrs. Anderson came over to help him, thinking that he was having trouble with the worksheet.
"Mrs. Anderson, I want to borrow James' blue crayon but you said he can't hear me even if I ask loud and my mommy said I shouldn't take things that aren't mine without asking."
Sue smiled at the little boy.
"James, could Sloan please borrow your blue crayon?" Mrs. Anderson asked.
James smiled and immediately handed Sloan the crayon.
"Thank you." Sloan said and then immediately said "Oh." When he remembered that James wouldn't be able to hear him.
"Give him a thumbs up, Sloan." Mrs. Anderson offered helpfully.
Sloan did and James grinned at him and returned the thumbs up. A few minutes later James reached over and grabbed Sloan's orange crayon and then gave him a thumbs up, hoping Sloan would return the thumbs up. Sloan did with a huge smile.
They continued doing this back and forth until they each finished the worksheet.
When lunch time rolled around Sloan grabbed his tray, he wanted James to sit next to him but if he motioned for him to follow him Sloan might drop his lunch so he hurriedly set his tray down and then went up to James, he didn't want James to drop his lunch either so instead of tapping him on the shoulder he just motioned for him to follow him, James did, and he happily took a seat next to Sloan.
That night Sloan told Jackie all about James and how he was really nice. When Jackie told Sloan about the sign language class Sloan excitedly told Jackie that he wanted to take the class. Jackie was glad Sloan wanted to take it with her, she was even more glad that Sloan was such a kind soul.
The End! Thanks for reading! Please leave a review!
