The day before surgery, from 10:15 til 10:45, they all drew ears.

        Planned, the art teacher said, before his dad told her Sebastian would get the cochlear implant.

        Sebastian added the ear’s head in profile. A word balloon: IT’LL HURT.  Smaller balloons, the kind in the original Batman series: SPEECH-LANGUAGE PATHOLOGIST! AUDIOLOGIST! POW! There were the parts of the device: the headpiece jutting out like a tag that stopped people from stealing TVs, the processor cable looping around the ear, connected to the sound processor.  He covered both sides of his paper, then drew, furiously, the inside: internal implant, electrode. The snail shell cochlea curled within the ear.

        He folded the paper and tucked it in his math workbook.

        His dad oozed guilt. A plate at a Chinese buffet, an appetizer at Applebee’s, a small Coldstone sundae.

        “Love you,” Dad kept saying, muffled and far away, like the operation was already happening. A chemical sleep.

          And then, Legos. The time when silence was okay. They snapped animals onto wheels.

            “Can I have a cookie, please?” Sebastian said-signed.

            “Sorry, buddy. Too close to midnight. Your stomach has to be completely clear tomorrow. You’ll be safe.”

            “But if I ate one?”

            “You could throw up. But I won’t let that happen. Neither would the surgeon.”

            “What would you do?”

            “Move the surgery, of course.”

            Sebastian nodded, let Dad kiss his forehead like the old days. His throat burned with salt.

            For hours after Dad thought he’d gone to bed, he Googled his thoughts.

cochlear implant ages

cochlear implant death

            He had the severe hearing loss in both ears, had tried stupid garbage hearing aids, but that wasn’t everything. If they had all the things on the list, babies did great. Little kids. He was nine and a half. Dad had seen some video on YouTube about an older boy it worked for, and he was gung-ho.

            GUNG-HO!

            Sebastian stood in the doorway of Dad’s bedroom at 3:36 a.m., two hours and nine minutes before the arrival time.

            Let’s just stay, he imagined signing. Let’s stay like we are.

            Sebastian ripped open a pack of knock-off Oreos. One, two. Chocolate coating his back teeth, ringing his mouth. After the fourth, he stopped and woke Dad, the crumbs on his face and fingers leaving fingerprints on the sheets.