( fingerspelling.
@kiaracrawfords Shiloh pulled at the nylon strap to her cheap and abused book bag when the Crawford house came into view, yanking it over her head and resting it on a shoulder to free both of her hands while she climbed the porch steps. It was a perfectly respectable home, appropriate for the “IT” mom of Wade, Illinois, arguably middle america’s best breeder of young mothers. She knocked just loud enough to be heard and took an immediate step back to put a little space between her and the door, gaze wandering to the flowerpots outside and then down to the soil they lived in: fresh and damp, recently tended to. She shouldn’t have doubted it, Kiara seemed like the unbelievably competent type, the kind that could juggle three children and two bake sales and do it with a smile. It would almost be intimidating if she wasn’t such a warm person, at least when it came to welcoming Shiloh into her home.
That being said, Shiloh hadn’t known the woman long, and hadn’t gotten much of a chance to know more beyond offering her daughter Arielle spotty-at-best sign language lessons for an hour or so at a time. The door swung open after a few long seconds and Shiloh looked up with a small, tight-lipped smile, hands still holding the strap across her chest.
It was their second or third lesson, but Shiloh still felt wildly out of place knocking on Kiara Crawford’s door, and to teach, no less. “--Morning,” like always her greeting was more of an afterthought, coming only after the few stalled moments it took Shiloh to realize she should be the first person to speak. She glanced at her watch to avoid staring too much ( she’d always been told it was a creepy habit ) and noticed too late that she was nearly twenty minutes earlier than usual. “Sorry, is Arielle awake yet?”