“I’m sorry about your father.” Jodi didn’t know what else to say; she couldn’t imagine what it would be like growing up without her dad.

Mary smiled softly, contently. “It’s okay. I hardly remember him.” Jodi thought it would be a good moment to change the topic of conversation, and it seems that Mary agreed. “But enough about me; we’ve been talking about me for an hour already. What about you and your family?”

“Well, I’m from Chicago, where my family still lives,” Jodi began, “I’m Jewish, as you might have noticed by my last name. My father’s name is Isaac, an accountant, my mother is Sarah, an English teacher, and my brother is Mark, a lawyer and regular pain in the ass.”

Mary laughed out loud before asking. “Big brother?”

“Only by three years.”

“Which makes you…” Mary asked, echoing Jodi’s question from earlier.

“31,” Jodi answered with a teasing smile. “Who’s the smooth one now?”

“You started it!” Mary replied with a laugh.

Her expression took a more somber tone, and for the first time during their conversation, her green eyes did not quite meet Jodi’s. The redhead recognized the look, and knew the next thing out the woman’s mouth was something to do with Jodi’s “peculiar” circumstance. “So… your family… are they… are they all like you?

Jodi couldn’t help but crack a joke. “You mean if they are all redheads with big noses?”

“No!” Mary said, almost alarmed.  It was a normal reaction from people that were too politically correct to be horrified when she made light of the fact that she was deaf. Jodi thought she better saved her “my favorite band is Deaf Leppard” joke for another day. Mary gave her a small, apologetic smile, apparently feeling that it was her fault that Jodi misunderstood. “I meant… you know…”

“You meant deaf,” she finished for Mary, smiling softly. The beautiful blonde seemed not to be too comfortable with the subject. Jodi couldn’t fault her for that; most people weren’t the first time they met a deaf person.

“Yeah… I’m sorry… If you don’t want to talk about it…” Mary backtracked, her cheeks blushing slightly. The artist guessed she was the first deaf person Mary had ever spoken to.