I’m going to stand by what I said before. Nothing good is going to happen. Ok? I don’t care that the sun was shining that day; I don’t care that Riley had a smile on her face as she was walking her new dog that day. The fact that she was on her way to Alex’s house doesn’t change anything either. I refuse to believe the fact anything could ever happen between them, and so should you. You’re just setting yourself up to be the one being heartbroken. Making up a great and beautiful life for them in your imagination isn’t going to change anything. You’ll just get upset when they never reach that.

Trust me, just let them live their lives.

Ok, sure, a friendship had been built up between the two despite their communication barriers, but that didn’t mean it would blossom into anything further. Why do two people of opposite gender have to be more than friends? They could easily have a platonic relationship without and sexual intentions coming in between. This isn’t some fairytale where they always end up happily ever after together. Friendship is also a perfectly acceptable thing.

The leash of the new yellow labrador was in Riley’s left hand, guiding her through the streets, while she was holding a plastic box in the other. Without any announcement, she had decided to surprise Alex with a gift. No other intentions than to thank him for his friendship. Every morning, he’d still be there to greet her, and he occasionally also brought a notepad along with him so they could have a short conversation.

Riley could often lip-read his spoken language if he made sure not to speak too fast, but there was no other way for Alex to understand her other than to make her write out her words. It was quite a hassle, and occasionally Alex had to write down his phrase too if Riley couldn’t understand what he was trying to say. However, with practice things seemed to go better. Riley had been born deaf, so she was used to writing out things for people and she actually was really fast at it, and Alex started perfecting the right speed and enunciation to use. They figured out how to keep their friendship going.

But that’s where it stayed at: friendship.

She slowly raised the hand holding the leash and rang the doorbell of Alex’s house. If she was honest, she had contemplated on doing it before when they hadn’t been formally introduced yet, but she never had the courage to do so. There was a reason why she hadn’t had many friends since she graduated from a special high school. She couldn’t find other deaf people to hang out with, and ‘normal’ people just thought it was too much work. The daily waving made her happy, and she didn’t want to ruin that. Alex probably was the only friend she had in awhile other than her brother (let me tell you a bit about that. That guy that opened the door for Alex? Riley’s older brother. Nothing going on between those two either), even though it was hard to find things out about each other. She was happy.

Just like the cake she had baked. Literally. It was cheesy as fuck.

She had been baking a cake with her brother when it was suddenly very obvious that they had made way too much batter. Of course, thinking of her friend, Riley immediately wanted to bake another cake, but to give away rather than eat herself. Her brother was reluctant at first. Not because he disapproved of the friendship, like me, but because it was a ‘secret’ family recipe that their Grandma always used and apparently made the best cake ever. Riley convinced him, though. Just a small gift for being so nice and all.

Alex, not having expected the quiet guest, was laughing loudly when he opened the front door. Coincidentally, he had another friend over for a while that was completely the opposite of Riley. His yellow-labrador girl was quiet (for a reason, of course, but still), didn’t seem to want to make a point about anything, and was generally a calm person. His other friend, however, was a hyper ball of excitement that voiced his opinion whenever he got the chance and wouldn’t stay quiet for a second.

You can already probably guess where this is going. Two very opposite people meeting. It always leads to either one of these two things. First of all, they could hate each other’s guts. Their difference would be too contrasting, making them detest each other without even knowing the other properly. It would lead to annoyed glances, scoffs whenever the other said something, and probably trash talking the other. Then the second option was them falling in love with each other. So, practically the definition of opposites attract. Their personalities on the opposite sides of the spectrum would balance out when they were together. It would be like they were meant to be. Now, these two possibilities are very different from each other, but who says that they are the only two that exist?

When Alex saw that it was Riley paying him a visit, he quieted down and smiled at her. “Hi,” he grinned, holding the door open as he leaned against it a little.

Riley beamed back and held out the clear plastic box to him with stretched arms. There was a small post-it note already stuck on the top with writing on it so that she didn’t have to do that anymore. Alex raised an eyebrow and took the box from her, peeling off the note and reading it. After his eyes had scanned all the words, he looked at the cake and laughed. Riley had made a round cake, glazed it in a bright yellow like her raincoat, and painted a smiley face on it. It was a happy cake.

Right after Alex thanked her with another laugh, Riley’s phone buzzed in her pocket. Although she could feel it, Iggy (the new yellow labrador retriever) barked once and turned to her to signal her that a message had arrived. It was all part of her training and was very useful if the phone wasn’t directly touching Riley’s body, but other times it was a little pointless.

She pulled out the device and wasn’t surprised to see that it was a message from her brother saying that he was coming back home from work. What she didn’t realize, however, was that there was a lot more commotion going on. Alex’s dogs had heard the bark and came scurrying towards the front door to see what was going on. The smaller animals started yapping and barking while the service dog stayed in place and didn’t get distracted. While Riley was casually replying to the message she had gotten, while Alex was trying his best to get his dogs to go back inside.

Another reason why they would never become a couple. The whole dog situation would never work out. As sad and mean as it sounds, Riley couldn’t really take care of anything that wasn’t trained. It wasn’t that she didn’t have the skills to do so, she just couldn’t hear if anything ever went wrong. She had already long accepted that starting a family wasn’t something that was likely going to happen to her.

“Jack,” Alex groaned quite loudly, calling his friend to help him out, “can you take Baz and Peyton back inside, please.”

Said friend and fellow band member announced he was coming, sounding like he had just stuffed his mouth full of food and was going to take a while to chew it all. He ushered the puppies close to him before he was even close to the front door and quickly locked them up in another room for the time being. That didn’t stop him from being the curious and nosey guy he was, though. He decided to check out who was keeping Alex at the door for so long. As soon as he saw the girl with long blonde hair, he regretted not having taken a smaller bite that he could have swallowed easier.

“Alex! Why the hell didn’t you tell me there was a hot girl here!” He shrieked, his voice still muffled by whatever food was in his mouth. Riley, however, had no clue was being said. The strange guy was talking way too quickly and unclearly (probably also due to trying to make sure not all the food fell out of his mouth). She concentrated all she could, but this was a whole new difficulty.

“Oh my god, Jack, fuck off, she’s my neighbor from two blocks down,” he sighed, another thing Riley could not read at all since he was looking at the lanky black-haired man. However, he went back to talking to Riley straight after in his slower and clearer voice, “do you want to come in?”

“Bro, why are you talking so weird?” Jack questioned, noticing the subtle change in Alex’s voice. It was probably a thing nobody else really realized, but this was his best friend we were talking about.

Riley didn’t take any notice of the guy who she couldn’t understand at all. Instead, she set her attention on answering Alex’s question. Luckily she had brought a notepad and pen along with her, stuffed into the pocket of her yellow raincoat, just in case she had to say anything. She quickly scribbled down that her brother was going to be home soon and that she wasn’t sure if she had to be there when he did. Alex just told her that she should ask him to come over as well. He hadn’t just befriended his yellow-labrador girl, but also her brother.

Jack just watched the interaction with confusion written all over his face. He had no idea what was going on. Alex would speak normally to him, only to use that weird voice for the beautiful girl, and she wouldn’t reply in spoken-words but in written-words. Another reason for them not to work out. The pair could easily communicate between themselves, but as soon as somebody other than her brother was added, things started getting complicated. Communicating one-to-one was an easy thing to figure out, but groups were the most difficult thing ever. Riley didn’t know who’s lips to read and people always forgot about talking clearly when with other friends. The whole language barrier became so much larger and much more difficult to break down.

“Anybody care to tell me what’s going on?” Jack interrupted, not being able to figure out any plausible answer to his questions.

Alex glared at his friend as he let the other one inside. “She’s deaf, don’t be so rude.”

“But she doesn’t look deaf.” Jack pointed out, taking in the appearance of the girl once more. She really seemed like the girl that could easily get any guy she wanted just because of her looks. There was no way somebody that looked like her had an impairment like that.

“Yeah, and you don’t look like you’d be in a pretty successful band, but look where we are now.” Alex rolled his eyes, doing anything to defend his yellow-labrador girl. It was only during that moment that he realized why Riley and her brother were so surprised with how easy he’d become friends with her. Most people didn’t understand how to act, and neither did Alex, but he seemed to be doing things right.

Jack shrugged and turned to his new acquaintance and started overenunciating his words while speaking very slowly and quite loudly. “Hi, I’m Jack.”

Riley instantly started writing on her notepad, telling him he didn’t need to speak like that, that she could easily understand him if he spoke the way Alex did. He would only make a terrible fool of himself if he would speak like that the entire time.

And now I’d like to remind you that this would never turn into anything other than friendship. Yes, Alex happened to have easily learned the ropes of finding a way to reach out to Riley, but that was only the first step. A relationship with her would mean so much more than commitment. They could hardly keep going on with writing notes and Alex hoping she could interpret his words. She’d be very dependent on him, which was going to be very difficult with him being gone most of the year. He wouldn’t have somebody who could support his career in any way. She couldn’t hear the songs and judge them for him, let alone be proud of the things he did.

It was an impossible route to take. Their friendship would be hard to maintain. How would mixing any remote feelings into it make it any easier?

Don’t expect them to move further than this. This is not a love story.

Don’t expect it to ever be.

Notes

Second chapter :D I'm ready for suggestions! Like, honestly, you guys are going to be the ones deciding how the story goes. I don't have any plot set out. You get the choose whatever happens between them. I'm just the one writing here. And I honestly don't care how weird/sexual/cute/annoying/sad it is. I won't judge you for anything.