Deaf Aids by David Rudd, green tea

‘Dad, you’re going to have to … DAD?’

  ‘What Anna?’

   ‘You’re going to have to get some hearing aids, Dad.’

   ‘Earrings?’ Bernard scanned her face. ‘Yes, they’re very nice. New ones?’

   ‘You’re proving my point, Dad. Not earrings. HEARING AIDS!’

   ‘Deaf aids, you mean.’

   ‘No one calls them that nowadays. They help you hear. They don’t help you go deaf!’

   There had been many conversations like this of late, and Anna was losing patience, which is why she’d booked her dad a test at the local Specsavers.

   ‘Specsavers?’ he queried. ‘They do eye tests.’

   ‘They also do deaf- er, hearing tests, Dad.’

    ‘There should be special branches then. ‘Earsavers’. His hearty laugh filled the lounge.

   The deafer he gets, thought Anna, the louder his laugh. It was good, though, to see him in a jolly mood. So often, nowadays, she found him morose and depressed. Ever since Mum’s death, in fact.

   Bernard went ahead with the tests and was informed that, in the upper range of his hearing, he had substantial losses.

   ‘That explains why I never hear you anymore,’ he informed Anna. ‘That squeaky voice of yours.’

   She bit her tongue and forced a laugh.

  ‘Wearing hearing aids,’ the audiologist had told him, ‘should arrest that loss.’

   Two weeks later, Bernard had them fitted.

   As he’d told the audiologist, he’d imagined something like the old, leather-cased packs that used to hang round people’s necks with a wire running up to one ear. His own father had one. Deafness seemed to run in the family.

   The audiologist had explained the aids to him, showing Bernard how to insert the tiny batteries and clip the compartment shut, thus turning the devices on. They sat behind each ear from which a thin plastic stalk, ending in a small plastic flower, was inserted into his ear canal.

   The aids were certainly light and discreet, but they were also a bit small and fiddly for Bernard, such that he had to rely on Anna much of the time. He’d found it all too easy to comb them loose, especially as the only hair he had was round his ears, of which he was quite proud.

   Worst of all, he would forget to put them in or change the batteries. It was only when Anna stood in front of him, mouthing, pointing to her own ears, that he’d remember (though sometimes he’d just compliment her on her earrings). But when he was on his own at home, which was most of the time, he’d forget all about them. Anna was forever railing at him:

   ‘What about when someone rings you, or the doorbell sounds? What if the smoke alarm goes off?’

   When he did wear them, though, Bernard was impressed at the difference. He could hear birdsong again, leaves rustling, rain splashing. And, most important, as far as Anna was concerned, she no longer had to repeat herself.

   One day, though, things changed dramatically, as Bernard later told Anna. He’d been sitting in Mum’s armchair (which he’d taken to occupying– it made him feel closer to Suzie, he said), enjoying a cup of tea and a biscuit.

   ‘And when I took a bite of it – it was a digestive – I heard this voice in my ear. “Mind those crumbs,” it said. It was Suzie, your mum! That Scottish lilt. It was as though she were there, right beside me.’

   Anna decided not to engage with her dad’s claims. ‘Poor Mum,’ she said. They’d lost her to Hodgkin’s lymphoma less than a year ago. Anna had tried to do her best for her dad, but life just wasn’t the same for him. She knew that.

   ‘Didn’t you hear what I said, Anna?’ Bernard persisted. ‘Mum was speaking to me, through those deaf aids.’

   ‘Hearing aids, Dad!’

   ‘As she spoke,’ he blithely continued, ‘I was reaching for a sup of tea to wash down the crumbs. But one was tickling my throat and I began coughing, and I slopped my tea.’

   Anna smiled obligingly.

   ‘That’s when your mum spoke again. “Och,” she told me, “now you’re making a real mess, ya corrie fister!” – that’s a left-hander,’ he confided to Anna, as if she hadn’t heard it many times before. ‘“Remember,” your mum told me, “that’s my chair your bahookie’s in!”’

   That broke through Anna’s cynicism. She laughed liberatingly alongside her dad.

   ‘See, Anna,’ he continued, no doubt thinking he’d convinced her. ‘It was definitely Suzie! Broader than ever, she sounded, because, she said, she was with her old kin.’ He paused for a while, then chuckled again. ‘Then she said,’ Bernard raised his eyes to the ceiling, ‘she was looking forward to me joining them.’

   Anna had to admit, she hadn’t seen him so upbeat in ages – perhaps since Mum’s death. But she had to be realistic. ‘It’s a lovely idea, Dad,’ she said.

   ‘But it’s true. You do believe me, don’t you Anna?’

   She couldn’t meet his eye.

   ‘Here,’ he suddenly said, ‘You wear them. Try for yourself.’

   ‘Don’t take them out, Dad. It’s been hard enough getting you to wear them!’

   ‘But don’t you want to speak to her? I’m sure she’d love to hear your voice.’

   ‘They’re hearing aids, Dad, not speaking aids!’

   She bent down to kiss him before leaving.

   Anna struggled to hold on to the fact that her dad was now happier than he’d been in ages. He no longer needed prompting about wearing his aids or replacing the batteries. In other ways, though, his demeanour worried her. She’d often find him chattering to himself, oblivious of her presence, as though in a delirium.

   It wasn’t long before other problems arose. From earlier struggles persuading him to wear the aids, her dad now refused to remove them – even at night. He said that’s when she – Suzie – most frequently came to him, speaking about the old days amongst the clan McTavish. Bernard had all the old photo albums out, scattered over the floor, and he delighted in pointing out different individuals and locations to Anna. Most worryingly, he frequently spoke about joining them.

   ‘They’re all up there,’ he’d say, ‘with a place saved for me.’

   And then came the day he complained his hearing aids no longer worked. When she saw them, Anna immediately knew why. He’d worn them in the shower, though he’d been repeatedly warned against this. The aids were replaced several times before it was decided it was a waste of time.

   Bernard finally accepted this, but begged Anna to let him wear his ‘death aids’ when he died. She was sure that’s what he’d called them, though he was confusing many of his words nowadays. For his sake, she approached the funeral director. Cremation was certainly not an option as all electronic devices (pacemakers, etc.) had to be removed, but her dad had never wanted this anyway. He wanted to be buried, alongside Suzie, and the funeral director was happy with this as long as there were no batteries in the devices.

   Bernard was overjoyed.

   ‘Why?’ she asked him, knowing she’d regret it.

   ‘The death aids will help me find her,’ he’d said, that verbal slip present again.

 

   It was the start of a speedy dementia, and carers were soon visiting several times a day. As they supervised his showers, though, he was allowed to wear his hearing aids again, which delighted him, and made talking to him slightly easier.

   Then, one morning, his carers arrived to discover him in his kitchen, complaining of a burning throat. They discovered that he’d swallowed two of the small, circular, hearing-aid batteries. He’d obviously confused them with his regular pills, which were the same size. The carers were apologetic but, although they supervised his medication, they couldn’t guard against him putting other things in his mouth, much like a toddler.

   Fortunately, Bernard had been discovered in time, and A & E had removed the batteries before permanent damage had been done. However, it was a turning point in his decline. He was no longer safe to live alone.

   A care home was found, which he took to surprisingly well. As long as he had his ‘death aids’, as he persisted in calling them, he seemed content. The staff said he wandered around much of the day, chatting away to himself. However, being predominantly young things, frequently sporting their own ear buds, they didn’t find this behaviour that strange.

   Bernard was only there a few months. All too soon, Anna found herself standing by her dad’s graveside. She was pleasantly surprised to see how many had come to his funeral. He’d been a popular man, she realised. Not only were there old friends and work colleagues, but also some of Suzie’s Scottish relatives, who’d travelled down specially.

   Anna spent much of the time at the reception on the question of him being buried with his hearing aids, ‘Or,’ as she related, ‘“death aids”, which is what he called them!’

   They were amused. ‘Does he think he’ll be able to hear us?’ one of the Scottish clan asked.

   ‘No,’ said Anna. ‘But he’s hoping to hear from someone else.’  

   ‘Perhaps,’ said a man in a kilt, ‘they really are “death aids”!’

   As was the case at many funerals, the laughter was therapeutic.

   But Anna suddenly had a thought that arrested her amusement. She pictured herself in her dotage, needing hearing aids for the deafness that seemed to run in the family. But it wasn’t the disability that worried her. It was the thought of putting them on and hearing her dad’s voice crackling in her head.

   ‘At last, Anna. Now do you believe me? Welcome to the clan!’

About the author  

 

Dr David Rudd is an emeritus professor who, after 40 years, turned from academic prose to creative writing. He has published some sixty stories, several appearing in ‘CaféLit’. A collection of his short stories, Blood Will Out, and Other Strange Tales was published in 2024 (available Amazon and elsewhere). 

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