He reads it and is very still for a moment. This whole method of communication is difficult, foreign to him, even as someone who does so much written word and did so much note passing at school. How can he express his sympathetic anguish in words?

Sorry, he types. And then, clumsily but at least articulating himself, he types out, How do you say his name?

One of his coworkers has talked about name signs because she's taking ASL at school. He knows how to spell in sign language, and that's about it. So he spells it out--B-E-A-U--rather clumsily, and then cocks his head slightly in question.