Question about the short film “Stutterer”

Question about the short film “Stutterer” Hi everyone! My NSA group was watching the short film stutterer this evening (great short film by the way!) if you haven’t seen it, here is a link. It’s a short film, only 13 mins. https://youtu.be/2m_VTZR5MU0 SPOILERS AHEAD—beware Anyway, per my watching and the Wikipedia article, it seems as if the main guy doesn’t know that the woman is deaf when they are just Facebook messaging. Is this true? Did he learn sign just to avoid stuttering or did he learn sign in preparation of meeting this woman? One of my friends at the NSA thought the latter, and that his anxiety was just so high that he couldn’t meet the woman.