Short Stories

Mute

It was peaceful, oh so peaceful. 

But that's what scared her the most. 

All her life had been filled with sounds and people but suddenly it was as if the world was put on mute. No cars driving along the road, no people chatting away. Not even a slight breeze or crunch of gravel shifting under her feet. Something was definitely wrong. But what? What on earth could possibly put the world on mute? Come to think of it there didn't seem to be any people around either. 

Strange.

She walked up to an open door of some nearby home and peeked through.

"Hello? Anybody around?" No reply. Hey, she thought, at least I know that not all sound is gone. She almost laughed at herself. Gods, I must be going crazy. Walking through the room she noticed shards of glass lying around and a few speckles of blood in a few places.

"What the fuck happened here?" she said so quietly it was close to a whisper. The bloody stench was enough to make her gag. She continued on through to the living room, which was connected directly to the hallway, and bent over, holding something in her hand as she rose from the ground. 

A feather. 

It was white, or at least it was supposed to be since it was mostly covered in blood and what she thought might be soot. The smell seemed to be getting stronger as she progressed, as though leading her towards something.

The house seemed pretty cosy, the walls were decorated with family photos. Cute. There was modern furnishing and heaps of room, natural light shining on the empty spaces. Usually, she found all these details to be comforting, but now, now there was something offsetting to it all.

Maybe a trail of blood leading from the living room to an unknown room was that 'something' but to her, it felt as though there was something else she was unable to pick up. Yet she still followed that messy trail that wound its way around the dirt-stained beige sofa, back out to the hallway. From the hallway she could see the remainder of the trail leading to a door right at the other end of the house, blood staining the walls too. Somehow the first time walking through the hallway she had missed these details.

Whispers started sounding, softly at first but getting louder as she went on through the house, getting closer and closer to that turquoise door with those chips in the paint. There was a loud high pitched screaming that didn't seem to end. She realized it was her. Why was she screaming? The whispers got so loud they were screaming back at her. But it didn't seem right.

In her head. The whispers were invading her head, crashing and bouncing off her skull. Her screams, internally and externally, filling the unnaturally silent world. Going on and on and on...

⚶

Bzzzt. Bzzzt. Bzzzt.

Her brain was a foggy mess, as it usually was. The same old dream. 

Every. 

Fucking. 

Day. 

This nightmare had been going on every night for the past 5 years.

Ever since that accident. After which she had withdrawn from most of her relatives. Especially her aunt and uncle, who had taken her in as a plaything to that wretched brat that was their daughter. They had two other kids, a shy dark-haired boy who was the youngest and a soft-eyed elder sister. With such a large family it was surprising that they were so eager to adopt the recently parentless girl who had been the lone survivor of the accident.