Her teachers were just as bad, or perhaps worse, since they were at least adults. Their cruelty came more in the form of thoughtless neglect than cold-hearted design. Ana had been refused a place at a special needs school. Her hearing deficiency was not deemed serious enough, and from the earliest age the only concession to her problem was to place her in a seat at the front of the class. Her teachers would then proceed to address the others over her head, or speak while facing the blackboard, so that Ana could not even read their lips.
For Ana herself it had resulted in slower than average progress and disparaging report cards.
Ana doesn’t pay attention.
Ana is clever, but she just doesn’t try.
Ana is lazy.
Ana doesn’t do her homework.
So unfair! Ana only ever missed her homework when it was delivered verbally to class, and she either misunderstood, or didn’t hear at all. Not one of her teachers took the trouble to write it down for her, or ensure that she understood what was being asked. She was just an irritation, an additional problem they didn’t need. A lumpen girl who sat at the front of the class. A girl who never responded, never participated, failed her exams and forgot her homework.
A girl who ached inside, hiding her misery and her loneliness from the world – even from her parents.
Her father was loving in his own way, but hardly ever there. A travelling salesman, he spent days on end, sometimes weeks, away from their home in a small apartment in Marviña old town, leaving Ana in the sole care of her mother. Although her mother came from a poor working-class family in a village in Catalonia, she had a certain conceit of herself, and always stood on her dignity. She adored Ana’s elder sister, Isabella, who was everything Ana was not. Pretty, clever, socially adept. And the ten-year age difference between the girls meant that they had virtually nothing in common, sharing very little of the childhoods that were always at very different stages of development. By the time Ana was nearing the end of secondary school, Isabella was already married with two young girls of her own.
Ana was viewed almost with embarrassment by her mother, as if her deafness were somehow her own fault, contrived to reflect shame on her family. When her husband was away she frequently chastised her daughter for failing to listen or understand, shouting at her quite unnecessarily when Ana was perfectly able to hear. Then, overcome with regret, she would smother the girl with love and tears, only to revert to type when Ana next frustrated her.
It was with some trepidation that Ana received the news her father brought home with him one night that he had obtained a place for her at a voluntary centre for the deaf in Estepona. Her mother was none too pleased either. It would be like announcing to the world, she said, that their daughter was disabled. Ana herself was less than happy. She was hard of hearing, she said, not deaf. But her dad had been insistent. The centre was run by a charity, but received government money in the form of a grant from the Junta de Andalucía. They provided facilities for the visually impaired, as well as the – and he chose his words carefully – hard of hearing. But it meant that Ana would get the opportunity to learn sign language, and that could only be a good thing. Ana was not so sure.
*
The centre was tucked away in a back street off the Plaza de las Flores in the old town of Estepona. Ana’s father drove her there on the first evening. After parking his car he took her by the hand and led her through the square up into a gloomy side street. ‘I’ll come and get you at nine, cielo,’ he said. ‘If you like it, you can get the bus next time.’ The centre was open three evenings a week, but Ana didn’t think there would be a next time.
An unprepossessing entrance led to a dark hallway that in turn opened into a large room set with tables and chairs, a couple of settees and several old armchairs. A hatch leading to a small kitchen released the smell of freshly brewed coffee into the crowded room. A young woman with short dark hair shook her father’s hand, and then Ana’s. ‘Welcome, young lady,’ she said. ‘Your father tells me you have hearing difficulties, but that you’re not deaf.’ Ana saw her eyes wander to the hearing aids in each of her ears. She nodded. ‘Good. Then that’ll make things much easier when it comes to learning sign language. We have an instructor who comes twice a week.’ Again Ana nodded. She didn’t want to let on that she had no intention of learning sign language. It would be like admitting that she was deaf. Perhaps, she thought, there was more of her mother in her than she might have wanted.
When her father had gone the young woman led her to a table and told her that someone would come shortly to speak to her and take down all her details. Ana sat and
