Ten Things no one knows about Emmett Beldrose. A little drabble about everyone's favorite deaf boy.

Ten things nobody knows about Emmett.

1. He loves to dance.

For someone who can't hear the music, Emmett has a really good sense of rhythm. When no one else is home, he locks his door, turns the radio up so high it shakes room, and just sort of...loses it.

He spins and kicks his legs, twirls his arms and leaps across the room. He turns into Billy friggin' Elliott. Sometimes he even adds in a few cartwheels.

2. He wasn't born deaf.

People assume he was, but that wasn't the truth. His parents both went deaf because of disease, not genetics.

For the first four months of his life, his ears worked fine. Then he got the measles. Melody and Cameron were both going to night school, and didn't have health insurance; They couldn't get him to a doctor until it was too late. He doesn't like to talk about it because it makes his mom feel guilty.

3. He remembers the sound of birds chirping.

He's never told another person that, ever. He doesn't know who'd believe him anyway, he was so young when everything was silenced. But he remembers, clear as day, lying in his crib, a chickadee in the tree outside. It was tiny, it's feathers all ruffled from the blowing wind. It opened it's mouth and chirped, sweet and clear.

It's the only sound he knows.

He likes to imagine Bay's voice sounds the way that bird did.

4. After the hearing girl who tried to flirt with him at the Kennish's fundraiser ran away in disgust, he went home and cried for two and a half hours.

5. His favorite color is a light, lavender purple.

He has absolutely no idea why. He doesn't like to talk about it.

6. He rides a motorcycle because Regina and Daphne got in an accident when he was twelve and now cars freak him out.

7. He's been called retarded nineteen times in his life.

Six times it was an adult. But only four times has he punched someone in the face for it.

8. Bay was his first kiss.

He'd rather die than tell anyone that. (He is a sixteen year old boy after all) Her lips tasted like watermelon Chapstick, and her hair smelled like some sort of exotic fruit. He had wanted to stand there, on the sidewalk outside Buckner Hall, for the rest of his life. He had practically skipped home and stayed up all night thinking about it.

9. And Toby was his third.

They had been at the music festival. It was dark, and both of them were spectacularly drunk. They were crammed up against thirty other musicans in a big mosh pit in front of the stage. Emmett could vaguely feel the vibrations of another band playing up onstage. He felt sweaty bodies swirl and twist around him. as someone pushed past him, he swayed and almost fell, but felt Toby catch him by the arm. Their eyes connected and in a split second, he found himself pushed up against a wall, making out with his girlfriend's brother. Toby tasted like beer and mint gum. And...it was sort of nice.

Toby didn't remember it the next day. Emmett tried to forget it too.

10. He would give anything to hear for just five minutes.

He didn't even want to hear anything special. Just Bay and Daphne's voices, laughter.

Maybe the sound of a bird, chirping outside his window.