Silent Night
Robert C. Waggoner
Copyright by Robert C. Waggoner
"Silent Night"
"Twas the night before Christmas and all through the night not a creature was stirring not even a mouse." Those words were stuck in little Johnny's head as he lay in bed awake on the night before Christmas. To be truthful, the only sound he heard was his heart thumping in his chest. He had prayed and wished so hard for a Playstation 4 that his knees hurt. He had asked his mom if he was going to be lucky and happy come morning. She insured him he would be happy no matter what Santa brought him.
He got out of bed in his Christmas PJs and tip towed to the window. He looked out and saw, through the glowing street light, soft flakes of snow drifting down. He rubbed his window with his arm to see better. Johnny thought maybe he would catch sight of Santa cruising over his house. He wiped his dripping nose on his arm as it was very chilly in his house because it only had wood heat and dad always let it go out at night. But precisely at six am he would go to the basement and light a fire. An hour later it was just barely tolerable to get out of bed. His mother nagged at father to replace the heating system with a new forced air furnace. His father always laughed and said that wood heat is much better for humans than gas burning furnaces. He promised to light a fire at four thirty on Christmas morning.
Looking out once again he could not see much as it was snowing so hard now that only the light cast a pale yellow glow. He went back to his warm bed. He tried hard to stay awake, but in the end sleep overwhelmed his stay-awake thoughts. Johnny's dreams were full of elves and toys. He saw a Christmas tree but nothing was under it. He felt panicky and just then his mother was shaking him awake.
Through sleepy eyes he could see her mouth moving, but no sound was coming out. He thought he had gone deaf. He jumped out of bed and put on his bathrobe. His mother left and he went to the bathroom. Strangely he could hear his water hit the toilet. Then he washed his hands and face also hearing the water run. Down the stairs he went two and time. When he got to the family room, both his mother and father were hugging each other. He thought his mother and father were so happy. But then he saw she was crying, but no crying sound was coming out of her mouth. His little sister, four year old Joan was sitting on the floor next to the presents opening one after another regardless of whose name was on the present.
His father turned to Johnny and tried to talk, but nothing or no sound came out of his mouth. His father walked quickly to his computer room and wrote a note. Now Johnny was only in the second grade, but he was a good reader and a terrible writer, his teacher told his mother. Father handed him the note and it said: "You mother and I have no voice." The second note read: "We can't hear anything. We're deaf."
Now Johnny was not stupid. Quite the contrary, he was a twenty first century kid born with a silver high tech brain. He looked up at his father and held out his hands as if to say, what do I do now?
Father on another post-it wrote. Call your aunt Joy. He wrote his sister's number and handed Johnny his cell phone. Johnny did one better than that he saw her phone number in his directory and punched it up. Instead of Joy answering the phone, her daughter, ten year old Alice said hello to the caller. Johnny said, "Hi Alice, this is Johnny. I'm calling because my parents can't talk or hear me talk to them. Can your parents talk?"
"Nope, nothing comes out of their mouths. Then they throw their arms around and act half crazy. Dad's loading our presents in the car right now and we're coming to your place. Bye got to run now."
Johnny scribbled a note to his father telling him what Alice had said about them on their way over. He nodded and followed his wife to the kitchen for breakfast. Meanwhile Johnny sat down beside his sister and helped her unwrap some presents. He couldn't find a gift with his name on it that resembled a Playstation. He got up and turned the TV on. He wanted to watch cartoons, but the channel he liked best did not have any cartoons. Instead was a woman standing their giving off had signals to the audience. Subtitles were on the bottom of the screen. He could not read all the words that were streaming across the bottom of the screen. He saw 'panic' and 'meeting' then he saw 'mayor'.
Johnny called his father, but remembered he could not hear. He got up and ran to the kitchen where he found his father drinking coffee. He pointed to the family room and mouthed TV. His father finally understood what he was saying. He got up and walked into the family room looking at the TV while still standing up. Johnny looked at his little four year old sister play with the boxes and wrapping. Turning back to his father he pulled on his arm to tell him what was being said. Father took out his note pad and wrote: "Adults in this town can't speak or hear any sounds. They're all deaf and dumb."
Johnny knew the deaf part, but not the dumb part. He shrugged his shoulders and went back to the kitchen where the smell of bacon was cooking. Mother, after the presents were opened, always cooked bacon and French toast for breakfast. Today was the same except the presents were opened but by someone who was not the recipient. Joan was the proud gift opener for the year. Johnny sat down and dug in. He was oblivious to the absent of voices that usually accompanied Christmas breakfast.
After breakfast he took pencil and paper to write a note. He wrote: "Playstation" and gave it to his mother. She looked at it and smiled. She nodded and got up with Johnny following her. Behind the tree was a blanket covering a box. Here was his desire. He hugged his mother and then proceeded to set it up.
It was then that his aunt and uncle showed up. Johnny had to open the door because nobody else heard the bell ringing. After all the hugs and kisses were passed around, Alice went directly to the Playstation. Johnny said, "Let's take it up to my room. I've a small TV we can use. I'm sure dad and Uncle Ben will watch football games as usual."
"Not today dumb Johnny. There aren’t any adults in town that can talk or hear anything. People are going crazy. Didn't you see anything on TV," said Alice.
"Nope I was eating breakfast. What do I care if adults can't talk. This means no school?"
"Beats me, but that sucks as I like school. I heard on TV, or rather read the sub titles that a satellite is to blame. I also read that it might be an alien satellite. Let's play the game shall we?"
Down stairs all four adults were sitting in the family room watching the TV. Words were streaming by so fast you could not look away for a second. The jest of it was that nobody really knew for sure what was happening. The government in DC was just as bewildered as the rest of the world. Government officials were using text messages to communicate with other worldly officials. All agreed to keep calm and not panic.
However, panic was the order of the day. Some thought it was a meteor that went by undetected. Others thought it was a chemical unleashed by a rogue nation. But those people did not notice those affected were around the world. Regardless of the cause, a cure must be found, but where to begin was the real question.
At Johnny's house, Christmas dinner went on as usual. However, the usual bowl games were canceled as they could not figure out how to call a play. Besides a player would have to hear the whistle if the referee blew it to stop a play or a penalty. Golf went on as usual as well as tennis.
After dinner both families sat around watching TV with no sound. Talking was absent and soon it became very frustrating having to write what someone was thinking or wanting to know. Finally, like most of the world, they focused on a news channel that would pickup news stories that were posted on line and from the governments.
Upstairs the kids were having the time of their lives playing with their new presents. Even little sister was sitting on the floor playing with her new doll. Both mothers came up to see what was happening and even though they could not hear their happiness, they could see and feel i
t. Johnny's mother pointed at the Playstation, then to the door and on down to the family room. Johnny nodded his head to affirm the request. Down the stairs they went. Johnny plugged it in and showed the parents how to play the game. That was the last Johnny or Alice played the game that Christmas day. It was taken over by the parents.
All went to bed hoping tomorrow all things would return to normal. Well, mostly all except the kids who loved the idea that their parents could not yell at them or make them to their chores. That included Johnny who took over his new Playstation the next morning as the adults flung their arms in frustration at not being able to converse. But Johnny and his little sister really did not notice much different after a few hours. They were just too busy doing kid things to see their mother crying in the kitchen and their father sitting at his computer pounding the keyboard to his employees at the local hardware store.
He had driven to his store and put up a sign with his email address if someone needed something very badly. After he returned home, he sat back down to his computer and read the news. There were pictures of the President having a news conference with the usual deaf person signing his speech. It was uplifting to read the