Noah's Flood

       There is sand on the kitchen floor and pasta sauce that has been left overnight on stacked plates. I look over at him and he’s looking over at me, his lips parted in a way that could easily be filled with words. For a moment, I wonder what his voice would sound like. His hair is orange, like a tabby cat. He’s on fire.

He blinks and now we’re mentally awake. We both get up and begin cleaning up our apartment, our apartment. I still love to say that.

“What a party,” I say and he smiles.

We left Atlanta two months ago and landed in Santa Barbara at four am, changing our names and beginning new.

His name is Noah. Mine is Brynn.

Our apartment has an open window and the walls are that color between white and beige where they try to be clean and good and new, but they’ll never be as clean as a hospital or as open as air. We have plants, too; everywhere. Noah tells me that they help him breathe. I just like to water them and watch them grow, because it makes me feel that if I am giving life to something then I have a reason to be alive.

I like the invasive species, even though I know I shouldn’t. Noah says I’m perpetuating their encroachment and encouraging mass genocide of other native plants, but, I don’t know, I just feel like they’re strong. Sure, they take down the others to live, but they thrive. And besides, I don’t put them into nature; I keep them in their little pots.

We have a porch where a lot of the bigger plants hang. We have a little early morning ritual on that porch. It’s unspoken and unneeded, but every morning I bring him green tea in a mug that’s in the shape of a whale and reads, Whale you be mine?

My own mug is a lopsided cup I made once in ceramics before I knew how to hold my hands steady; it’s a little crooked, but I like it.  

The porch is my favorite spot because we have this couch that sits out there and we hadn’t even intended to have the couch. We minimally decorated the apartment and then we drove down the street the week after we had both gotten our first jobs and bought some pink moscato to celebrate. Noah loves wine and he says that he doesn’t care if it’s girly or pink, because most things in life that seem weird at first usually end up tasting and feeling good.

We were on our way home, laughing about jobs and life, and there it was: the couch. It sat with one leg on the street and the other three on the curb, evidently from someone quickly tossing it down and running back into their own apartment. It was a brown, leather couch and the leather was cracked just a little on the left corner where someone burned something into its skin. The stuffing was sort of wet because it had rained and rained for two days straight when we had first arrived. We were just excited and felt lucky. We grabbed the couch and put it in Noah’s small SUV and drove away, smiling about ripped leather.

We already had a couch for our living room, a gift from my brother-in-law, but this couch meant movement. It was our first something for this new place. That’s when we decided to put it on the porch and make the porch more into a little reviving spot with love and sunrises. We moved a rug out there and hung ferns from the roof. Lucille, our cat, sits on the couch out there and sometimes chews on the leaves.

***

We were at a park when we met freshman year. I was dating this brute of a dude, six foot something and the hands to match. I was always offering to help him clean his apartment or walk his dog because, I don’t know, I was this small, scared freshman who assumed college was all about men. Anyway, I’m walking his dog at this park when suddenly the great dane, as big as his owner, freaks out and sprints away, causing me to lose grip on the leash.

“Boss!” I yell, but the dane is barreling towards the river, chasing something.

“UGH STUPID DOG! BOSS!” I’m sprinting after him, but this dog was made for the olympics and there’s no way I can catch him. When I make it to the river entrance, there’s a guy knee-deep in the water, wading after Boss.

“No! Oh god, it’s fine! He’s unruly, just - just let him” I lean over and breathe. I need to go to the gym. I look up and see Boss obediently following behind the guy as they approach.

“How - how did you get him to do that? He hates me, I’m pretty sure, since I’m not Trent and you know, he’s like huge and maybe Boss - that’s the dog - assumes he can just do whatever. Ha, male dogs, am I right?” I stop because the guy is staring at me with a smirk on his face.

“Uhh anyway, thank you,” I say, absentmindedly gesturing with my hand, and reach out my hand for the leash.

The guy suddenly becomes very animated very fast and starts mouthing things and moving his hands around so fast that it looks like he’s trying to swat a fly.

Then I recognize a sign and I realize he’s deaf.

“I’m sorry,” I sign and then speak slowly so he can read my lips, “I only know a few signs from my sister.” Then I sign my apology again. He nods, understanding and looks extremely upset and embarrassed. I smile awkwardly, take the leash, and begin to lead Boss back to the car when I decide, for some reason, that I shouldn’t leave.

“Hey!” I say to his turned back and then roll my eyes at myself for calling after him. I walk up and pull on his arm.

“Hey … uh - can I, I mean would you mind if I practiced? Signing, I mean.”

He stares at my lips for a second and something flips in my stomach until he smiles and nods. We sit and play fetch lazily with Boss until he eventually tuckers out and lays down at my feet, making me feel like he’s starting to warm up to me. Noah teaches me all the dirty signs first and he laughs because I try to say “Let’s have sex,” but instead said, “Let’s do the orange.” Noah starts snorting and covers his mouth, but I just laugh harder and then he teaches me the sign for funny and we keep doing it over and over.

I tell him my sister taught at a deaf school in Peru for a few years and he asks why I never learned fluently like my sister. I don’t have an answer.

Eventually I get a call from Trent asking very rudely where the hell I am. Boss perks up at the sound of his voice and starts barking.

“You better be f*****g taking care of my dog. Get home now.” I hang up on him and tell Noah I have to leave, but neither of us gets up.

“I want to move to California and get a cat named Lucille. I love that name.” I try to finger spell the name, but give up.

“Georgia is so deafening,” I say and then I immediately pause, embarrassed. Noah looks confused.

“I’m sorry. I don’t mean literally deafening. I mean that the world here is so full of the church screamers and I feel like I’m constantly being judged and yelled at. I can’t hear myself think when four hundred people are like all yelling at me, telling me everything I do or feel is wrong.”

Noah doesn’t do anything except look at me in a way that I know he understands. He doesn’t have to speak. He’s just reading me and listening.

Thank you, I sign.

Thank you, he signs back.

***

When we first moved in, there were weird stains on the floor and the fridge looked like it had probably harvested drugs for years. The countertops were sanded down and the floors were always littered with potential splinters. Each room had a different smell, but floated under a mask of air freshener that had been dimly wafting for a few hours before we had entered. The kitchen smelled like everything was burnt: the stove, the pantry, the fridge, the floors, the counters, the knobs on the drawers.

Everything smelled like black fire.

My bedroom is the smaller of the two, but has a small little window which I told Noah is all I care about. I put a cactus on the windowsill and now it smiles at me every morning and the weird throw up smell doesn’t seem as pungent as it did that first week. Noah’s room sits across the hall from mine and has a nicer closet, but no window. Our bathroom snuggles between the bedrooms; a blue curtain hangs down, hiding the razors and the soap.

We were disappointed when we moved in. Noah’s family didn’t even care that he was leaving and maybe that was even worse than them trying to make him stay. My parents didn’t know until the morning of. I haven’t contacted them yet because I’m afraid they’ll convince me to come back. Noah’s family ignores him and he didn’t want to get stuck after graduation, like the rest of his family. We left the day after we got our diplomas; we didn’t even walk, we just finished finals and drank while everyone was at the ceremony. We hadn’t been talking much, just listening to the sound of our lives shrinking. Then Noah leaned over to me and signed, “I have an idea.”

And we left a week later.

 

Noah moves around the living room, vacuuming and wiping tables at the same time. I start whistling My Little Sunshine and, even though he can’t hear me, I sing to him anyway. I pick up Lucille and dance with her around the apartment while Noah sashays and salsas around us. I put Lucille on his shoulders, where she balances and then hops off, running around the corner before I can pull her back into a dance again.

“It’s 10. You have to go to that festival and take pictures, right?” Noah signs.

“Yeah, yeah. Will you go with me?”

He rolls his eyes, because I always ask and he always says no.

“Yeah. I will.”

I don’t even ask if I read him correctly, I just jump and point at him, yelling, “YES!”

Reading my lips, Noah rubs his nose with two fingers and a thumb, the sign for funny, and shakes his head at me, “Do you want pancakes?”

“Duh.”

 

We’re about to walk out the door when I ask Noah if turned off the stove, because he always forgets. He exaggerates his yes because I’m always nitpicking him about it. We make a good duo: Noah cooks and I nag about the mess afterwards.  

Then we begin stretching over the streets, just two friends, leaving our fingerprints on crosswalks, windows, and the shoulders of strangers as we slide through crowds.

I work for the The Review as a photographer and I go to different events throughout the week and take pictures and then write little poetic paragraphs below each one so that, when someone sees the picture, they will feel the image through the words. At least, that’s what I want.

Noah loves to cook and miraculously landed a job as assistant chef at Le Petit Chateau, which is only a few blocks away from our apartment. He had originally hoped to be a waiter, and even that was pushing his hopes a little high, but when he went in to apply, their assistant chef quit on the spot and the manager asked if he knew anything about cooking. It was almost meant to be, like Santa Barbara had been waiting for us.

He has weekends off, which is when I try to force him to come to my events. We stop for croissants and coffee and then we’re almost to the small art festival a few blocks down the street. Noah grabs my arm before we enter the closed off street and signs, “Wait, I don’t know. Maybe I shouldn’t go. I’ll wait over here.” His eyes are dilated and a bead of sweat drips down his hair and into his collar.

“Hey, it’s okay.” I grab his hand. “It’s okay. These people are quiet and old.”

Noah looks up the street and I look with him: the usual crowd of slow-moving grandmothers with square glasses and pocketbooks have been replaced by an increasing source of a young crowd who all probably have nicknames they gave themselves in dark corners.

I grab Noah’s arm, look straight ahead, and steer him into the crowd. He’s stiff and straight-backed, but he moves and holds my hand on his arm. We move slowly through the crowd and Noah’s breathing slowly returns to normal and he focuses on our footsteps and I sign to him all the wonderful things around us: “Use your other senses. The sun feels warm. Look how colorful everyone is. People are happy to be here. Your blood runs through your body and it’s happy too. Your legs love your arms and your arms love your body and your body loves you. You are good.” He nods, methodically, to my words.

Noah never told me why he hates crowds or why bodies are sometimes too there for him, but I assume it’s because people stare. People aren’t used to dealing with deaf people and they get uncomfortable. He would never admit that that’s the reason why, though. I let him think I don’t know. We’ve been friends for too long and I know what he needs.

I continue to lead Noah through the crowd, stopping occasionally to take a picture. There is a girl holding a puppy as she asks, “Mama please, please can we get him?”

I take pictures of lovers’ eyes, old and young, and groups of teenagers trying to decide if they have enough money for peaches and jams. We avoid the huge school group that originally scared Noah and instead work slowly through each booth. We meet local farmers and families who sell vegetables from their own gardens and little girls who have made their own bracelets with beads made from Georgia clay. We buy a bracelet each and the little girl takes my dollars and smiles, “Thank you, miss!”

After a little while, Noah reminds me that he needs to stop by the restaurant to pick up his paycheck. I want to take the long way and maybe pick up some new sunflowers for the living room. Noah gives my hand a squeeze and then walks down the street and towards the restaurant. I take a photo of him walking away, with one of his hands on the back of his head and the other hanging at his side. If I could paint, I would paint the simplicity of a man walking down the street: hands free, head straight.

On the way back to our apartment, I take pictures of the streets and the cars on the crooked streets. I look at my reflection in cracked windows and smile back with teeth that look broken. The cobblestones catch my feet a few times, but I keep walking. I finally come to the sunflower lady.

Pamela has hair the color of charcoal and black fingernails that trail smoke through the air when she talks. She wears a red bandana in her curly hair with green vines painted on it.

“Hello, Brynn. Just a few stems today?”

I nod and quickly snap a picture of her leaning over her small garden, picking up sunflowers and cutting off the tattered roots. She winks as she hands them to me.

“How’s Noah?” She asks.

“He’s doing a lot better! Yeah I really think he likes the apartment a lot. We finally put those pictures up and got some new curtains, which I think helps him kind of not feel like we ran away as much.”

Pamela smiles, “That’s really good. I’m glad to hear you guys are settling in. You let him know I said hello.”

“Of course!” I smile and begin walking down the street.

As Pamela waves goodbye, her jewelry clinks and shines in the light and her smile is so warm. She is beautiful.

I continue to the apartment, whistling My Little Sunshine, thinking of Santa Barbara and Noah and Lucille. I think about our couches and our plants, complementing each other in colors and textures. I think about the poetic paragraphs I’ll write for all the photos I took today, like Pamela’s face in a half shadow and I think of the words Sunflowers are not limited to green stems and golden petals. I turn the corner and I decide that I’ll probably paint something, because I can take pictures of nice things and capture all this beauty, but I want to try and create it.

My mind fills with thoughts of gold and how I could possibly paint a field of flowers as I walk up our front steps. I’m thinking about hanging my painting on the wall of our apartment as I turn the key. I’m thinking about the sun and Santa Barbara and Noah and the beaded bracelet on my wrist as I walk into black air.

I think it’s the sun, shining so brightly. I assume it must be the sun shining in my eyes and slipping into my throat, thick and quick. It’s too loud to be the sun.

Fire.

Our apartment.

“Wh - ” I can’t get anything else out. I start searching, grabbing my pockets and my face, looking for Noah and nothing makes sense.

The smoke alarm goes off, delayed, loud and screeching.

I feel his fingers pull on mine. He’s pushing me down the front steps and his face is blackened.

“Noah,” I whisper, unable to say anything else. Lucille is in his arms, bundled in a burnt blanket.

“Brynn,” Noah whispers and his voice sounds damp, but cracked. It’s the first time I’ve ever heard him speak.

I don’t look at him as he moves me away from our home. I hear the sirens in the distant. Please hurry, I think.

I feel his body alive by mine. Lucille lies in his arms, curled up, back arched, and ears folded in fear. I curl my right hand into a fist and rub it in circles on my heart over and over again until Noah does too.

We’re saying sorry. We’re so sorry.

Noah reaches down and squeezes my fingertips, I watch the leather couch burn and crack, splitting down the middle until the flames seem to be coming from the cotton filling. He takes my hand and places a small piece of ceramic into it. I wipe off the soot and the cursive letters are still there: Whale you be mine­­?

***

We’re in a one bedroom apartment on Clarke Street. There is only one window and it’s dirty. Lucille lounges on our olive green sofa. The couch would probably look better if I threw up on it. Maybe I will. Noah walks in and smiles at me.

We’ve been here a few weeks and everything is going really great. We got a huge check for damages from the old landlord. The county is taking him to court for faulty appliances. Apparently a few other apartments he owned in town also caught on fire over the summer months.

Noah sits down on the couch with me and we talk for a bit and I really do feel happy in our s****y, dark apartment.

“You know what’s interesting?” I sign and Noah raises his eyebrows.

“I always thought that if I moved somewhere anywhere than Georgia, I would be happy. I would have everything I want. I would have a really great apartment and a cat named Lucille and I would have lots of plants. But then I realized something: whatever made you unhappy in Georgia, will probably make you unhappy in California and in, I don’t know, Vermont and Tennessee and on the other side of the world. You carry your unhappiness with you. Places don’t make you sad, you do. Unless you better yourself, you can travel all over the f*****g world and still feel claustrophobic and alone. Moving somewhere new can help, but it’s not going to fix you. You take yourself wherever you go. I always thought when I moved to California I’d be this different person. I’d be Brynn, I’d be someone else who was 5 inches taller and several inches thinner. I’d drink chai tea and really, really know myself. People would think I was somebody and now - now, I don’t think I’m nobody, but I don’t think I’m somebody either. I’m just - just Beth and I’m from Georgia and, you know, that’s it. Why did I always think that that was the worst thing to be?”

Noah points to me and then rubs his nose with two fingers and a thumb.