Breaking the Silence

Twelve

I stopped in the bathroom to wash my hands and clean the blood from my face. My nose was finally done bleeding, so I already felt better. However, I was breathing heavy, to hold back the waterworks, and the motion of expanding my lungs really hurt in my rib cage. I had to force myself to breath heavy, but in short, shallow breaths. It was awful.

I knew I ran a lot, when I wanted to get away from whatever was bothering me. But that was my only instinct. I wasn't allowed to run from my problems inside the home, so I took advantage of the privilege I got when I was out. And while running towards home doesn't sound particularly smart of me, it was still some sort of a sanctuary. School was my sanctuary away from home; home was my sanctuary away from the people at school. It was the only way I knew how to work around some of my problems in life, and there were a lot of those.

Walking home was even more brutal than walking to school that morning. My spine and my tailbone deeply ached with every step. My ribs became knives with every breath, and my wrist's throbbing became pulsating. I needed to lie down and sleep for, like, a hundred years. That would be nice.

I neared the park I had stopped at two days prior. My mood lifted a little as I thought about the horses I'd sketched. Maybe they would be there again, and I could say hello, well at least sit by them. Changing the direction my feet were leading me, I crossed the road and trod across the dying grass to the fence. Peering over, I scanned the pasture, up and down as far as I could see. They weren't there. Disappointed, I turned around to continue on my way to the house.

"Are you looking for the ponies?" A small voice called. I looked up in the direction the voice had come from and spotted a child bouncing her way towards me. She stopped about three feet away and tilted her head up. "They aren't here right now," thanks, Ms. Obvious. "They never are in the afternoons. Sometimes I see them on Saturday's if we're here in the morning. They're nice; I pet one once!"

I smiled at her and nodded, my only way of thanking her for the information. I wish I could talk to her, ask her more about the ponies and if she likes to look at them too.

"Amber!" An adult voice scolded. We both turned to see a woman walking this way across the grass. She was tall, with long blond hair and appearing to be in her twenties. She approached and grabbed the girl's hand. "I'm so sorry if she's bothering you," she said in a rush, as if embarrassed about the child. "She's very open, and inviting to strangers." She paused with a chuckle, "we're working on it."

I gave her a soft smile, hoping I came across as not bothered by the kid at all. She was adorable!

The woman stroked the girl's hair, telling her to go back to the playground and find her sister. I looked to the play set and was surprised to see an exact copy of the first child swinging around on the monkey bars. Twins!

Looking to me, she opened her mouth to say something before she paused, and her eyes got the concerned look in them like Jaycee had. "Are you okay? Do you need me to call someone for you?"

I brushed her off with the shake of my head and started to step my way back to the sidewalk. She watched me go past her before she spoke again.

"Well, okay. Have a nice day. . .?" She drew out the sentence, and it ended sounding like a question. Like she wasn't sure if that was the right thing to say. Glancing back at her, I see that her eyebrows furrowed and seemed to be thinking hard about something. After a quick second, she appeared to . . . did I see her sniff the air?

Slightly weirded out, I quickened my pace a tiny bit, ignoring the sharp pain shooting up rib cage.

When I got home, the house was empty, and I was finally able to relax. I thought about crumpling to the floor right there, but then I thought about how bad that would be when Jack opened the door and then proceeds to trip over me. Oh, that would be very bad!