What We Hear in the Silence

To understand a story such as mine you would have to go back to the beginning. To the room in which I spent most of my waking hours. To an outsider it would look to be a dingy, barren sort of box. What wallpaper remained was faded and peeling. For me, that room was a refuge. A sanctuary with a simple wooden dresser, a bed, and a few dolls scattered about the floor. An old quilt I liked to wrap myself in whenever I heard shouting. Which happened quite often.You see my stepfather was not a rational sort of man. And on those nights when he took to drinking(which also happened quite often) he became an angry sort of man. My mother and I would share a knowing look as she would tell me to go play quietly in my room. “No matter what you hear outside your door you must promise me that you will not come out.” Of course, I never did. Until one night when instead of the screams returning to muffled sobs, they stopped completely. The silence more alarming than any sound I could imagine. Immediately I knew. I would never hear my mother’s voice again.