Jongdae

Jongdae liked to think of his parents as former athletes, which was ironic even for a made-up story because he himself was nowhere near a decent sportsman. What was funnier was that he knew his parents would be the type to only golf if a client wanted to talk business over a few rounds on the field, and even then they would be abysmal (natural or on purpose, he wouldn't know) just to earn the liking of their clients. 

Still, Jongdae liked to tell his friends that his father was a baseball coach, and his mother was a retired ultimate frisbee player. He had genuinely grown up believing in that himself, or rather he'd spent such a long time in his childhood convincing himself of that he's almost believed in it. This was the only way how he could explain why his mother was always throwing plates at his father, and the latter would hurl something back in return. When he started turning deaf in middle school, Jongdae thought it was funny how his family's version of War of the Titans promptly turned into a game of wordless charades whereby he would have to guess what his parents were arguing over. 

Not like there was anything new to argue over, really. Finances, lack of the semblance of a family, and him. 

Jongdae didn't even have to be able to hear to know that they were probably arguing over him. His mother had once approached him after a fight to tell him, in writing, that his father was absolutely staunch against the idea of a cochlear implant or hearing aid. That was two years after his progressive hearing loss had started, and it was already at a state of 70% loss. His dad told him gruffly later, in text this time, that the last thing Jongdae should do is to resign to his fate and get a hearing aid. 

"Be a man and learn to read lips and speak," it read.

See? He sounded exactly like that abusive baseball coach every school had that churned out depressive players but winning teams. Jongdae had him to thank for retaining most of his speech abilities, but he still found it hilarious how his parents, after all these years of having a Deaf in their household, still believed that it was him who should learn lip-reading and not them who should pick up sign language. 

They actually still believed in the myth that lip-reading was a thing among those who lost their hearing. 

They actually still believed that their son could do well in a mainstream school. 

Jongdae's household was all about believing in things they wanted to believe in. After a while, Jongdae wasn't sure what to believe in anymore.

Jeongsun was probably the first friend he had made whom he could actually talk to rather freely, without an hour of providing contexts. Sure, he knew other Deaf people from networks he had joined too, but something about the girl and the circumstances in which they met piqued his interest. 

It was easy to drop the lies about his parents in front of her, because he quickly found out as they hung out, that they were both stuck in the same plight. Jeongsun wanted to be in a school for deaf-mute individuals as much as he did, but he mother insisted that mainstream education was the way for her to be normal. Jongdae let her know that his father thought a he