Funny Feelings (38)

We already got into an argument before heading over because I do a fine job with her hair and the dance makeup stuff, but she was adamant that Farley would do it better.

So, we’re here, imposing on her an hour earlier than I planned.

Tonight is about Hazel, though, and I hate that the lines continue to blur in my head. That even though it should be separate, should be just like any of the other recitals we’ve dressed up for and attended together, that tonight already feels charged.

It boggles my mind that you can know someone; every angle and curve of their face and figure, every quirk and dislike, and in an instant that comfortable familiarity can change to this adrenaline-infused, nervous excitement. That especially because I know her, and now know the taste of her mouth and the cadence of that sound that replays in my mind, that I only want to know more. To see what other sides and sounds and discoveries I can uncover, even more than I may have wanted to in the past.

I register an erratic motion in my peripheral and my vision refocuses on Hazel, waving irritably. “Dad. Let’s go.”

Fee opens the door, then, smiling radiantly. I trip a little, my toe catching on a crack in the concrete, if I had to guess.

Definitely not just because of how fucking beautiful she looks.

Because this is like every other recital, like the other five or ten or whatever number of times she’s joined me, been the great fucking friend that she is to me and to my daughter, who loves her.

Tonight is about Hazel, but I’d truly be as moronic as Haze thinks I am if I didn’t admit to myself that it weighs more. That time doesn’t once again make me zero in on this moment, realizing how thankful I am to fate or God or the Universe or Walt-fucking-Disney—whoever’s up there pulling the strings—that Fee stomped into my life, as inconvenient and powerful as the storm that same day.





FARLEY



Hazel’s slap on my thigh stings and I catch her eyes in the mirror as she laugh-apologizes. “That was harder than I meant to! You and Dad both have the same brain bug tonight!”

“What do you mean?” I sign, dropping the mass of her stiffly sprayed curls.

“He was doing the same thing. Spacing out. And had the same dumb look on his face.” She tilts her head and stares off to the side, an open-mouthed, lopsided smile, miming exaggeratedly.

I tap her shoulder with the back of my hand, admonishing her with a laugh. She tilts her face up to me and grins. She’s got the same colored eyes as Meyer, that clear blue that’s so crystalline it can be hard to look at. Like a block of ice, just as difficult to hold for long. Just as sharp. I set the brush down again.

“I have a lot going on with work. And your Dad is helping me, like always. I’m sorry if he’s acting…” I struggle for the right way to say it in ASL. “Tired because of it.”

“I know he’s not tired. He’s bouncy.”

“I thought you just said he looks like this,” I mimic her impression and she laughs.

“He’s either bouncy or he stares like that. And you guys are weird with each other.”

“What on Earth are you talking about?” I pick up the brush to occupy my hands and limit myself from saying anything further.

“I’m Deaf. Not blind,” she manages to deadpan in ASL and I clamp my lips together, refusing to laugh, trying to look stern even as a snort escapes.

“That joke is inappropriate, Hazel.”

“You can’t be funny if you don’t take risks. It would have been bad if you said it. It’s okay if I do.”





“I’ll go check her in if you want to grab us seats,” I tell Meyer as we walk up to the auditorium.

“Alright,” he smiles at me. I idly wonder if his smiles are getting tired from how much more frequently they flicker lately.

“Go kick ass, and be proud of the work. The reward is in the work. I’m proud of you. I love you,” he signs to Haze. The same dad speech he gives before every recital. The first time he said it Hazel and I frowned at each other, then at him, until he explained that it was what came to mind since it was what his dad always said to him before his football and baseball games. “I thought it still applied.” He’d shrugged.

She laughs as usual. “I’ll kick ass, dad. I love you.”

I get Hazel backstage and get her settled with her teacher before we do our affirmations.

“What I don’t hear, I feel. What they lack in knowing I make up for in showing,” we sign together. The rhyme itself is not translatable by rhythm or phonological sound, but its meaning is the same. We’ve said it since she first began doing this, back when she was worried she couldn’t do it well enough because of her frame of understanding. I told her how every artist feels that way. How we all wonder if what we feel is making it to the stage, microphone, page, or canvas well enough. That we can’t ever know what they understand, all we can do is use our tools and what we feel, put our hearts into it, while keeping it good for ourselves, first and foremost. I don’t actually know if Meyer himself has heard this, but I suspect that it’s just for her and I.

We salute each other before I turn to head out, my smile stuck on my face, not able to loosen quite yet, when I hear an overloud chuckle and a “Hey!” off to my right. I turn to a man I vaguely recognize.