Breaking Chains

Part 2: Silent Pain

The cold autumn air whispered through the cracks in the windows as Hannah sat on the couch, staring blankly at the flickering television. The house was silent, save for the hum of the refrigerator in the kitchen and the occasional creak of the old wooden floorboards. It had been like this for months now—still, quiet, almost unnervingly so.

Her mother had left almost a year ago, but it still felt like it was happening all over again each time she walked through the door. She could still hear the way her mother’s voice had trembled the last time she’d spoken to her—telling her she had to go, that she needed a “fresh start” and that Hannah would be “fine.” That was the last thing she’d heard from her mother before she disappeared without a trace.

Hannah still couldn’t understand why. She couldn’t comprehend how someone who had promised to be there forever could just leave without a second thought. It wasn’t like she could even remember a good reason for it. The days that followed had blurred together—each one melding into the next in a haze of confusion and sorrow.

Her father, once vibrant and filled with love, had become a shell of himself. He had never been a particularly open person, but after her mother left, he retreated even further into himself. He spent his evenings glued to the television, his eyes vacant, as if the world outside no longer mattered. He no longer had the energy to make her dinner or ask how her day had gone. When she came home from school, he was either in his room with the door closed or sitting at the kitchen table, papers scattered in front of him, the weight of bills, overdue notices, and worries about how to keep them afloat hanging over him like a dark cloud.

There were nights when she would lie awake in her room, the sounds of his soft sobs echoing through the thin walls. She would hear him breathing heavily, as if trying to mask the sound of his despair. There were times when she would sit up in bed, unsure of whether to approach him, but the thought of seeing him so broken, so helpless, always left her paralyzed.

Hannah had never known how to fix things. She had tried to be strong, to act like everything was fine, but the truth was, nothing felt fine. Not anymore. The absence of her mother had carved a hole in her heart, one that had only grown deeper and wider over time.

It wasn’t just her dad’s withdrawal that made the pain unbearable—it was the silence that hung in the air. The silence of a home once filled with laughter and warmth, now replaced by awkward stillness. There were no conversations at the dinner table anymore. No more family movie nights or casual chats about their day. There was no more connection, and it felt like the only thing that tied them together now was the unspoken grief they both shared, the pain neither of them knew how to express.

After school, instead of running home to the safety of her parents’ love, Hannah found herself wandering the streets of Vancouver. She wasn’t sure where she was going. The city felt just as lonely as her home. She would pass the same street corners, the same coffee shops, and the same parks where she had once felt connected to the world. But now, all of it felt distant. Everyone else seemed to have their lives together, their families intact, and here she was, drifting, alone, unable to pull herself back together.

The clinking of the school bell signaled the end of the day, and just like that, the world around her came back into focus. She walked out of the school gates, heading home, but every step felt like a weight added to her chest. Her hands, once steady, now shook as she tried to hold on to the thoughts she’d had throughout the day. All she could think about was the numbness she felt when she returned home.

The silence. The emptiness. The way her father no longer looked at her, no longer saw her. She used to be able to run to him for comfort, for reassurance that everything would be okay, but now she felt like a stranger in her own home. There was no one to comfort her. No one to explain why her mother had left or why her father was so distant.

It was the silence that gnawed at her, the sense of abandonment that she couldn’t shake. Every corner of their home seemed to echo with it. Every room felt smaller, tighter, as though the very walls were closing in on her. She didn’t know how to make it stop, how to make things feel normal again. She just wanted things to go back to the way they were before her mother’s departure.

Hannah shoved the front door open and walked inside. The house smelled faintly of old food and mildew, the scent of neglect hanging in the air. Her father was sitting in his chair, hunched over the table, his face buried in a pile of papers. He didn’t look up when she entered.

She stood there for a moment, wondering if he even realized she had come home. It felt as though she was invisible to him. He hadn’t acknowledged her in days, weeks even, and she was starting to wonder if he ever would again.

“Hannah,” he muttered, not looking up. “How was school?”

The question felt like an obligation, something he asked without any real interest. Her stomach tightened as she struggled to find words to respond. What could she say? That she felt abandoned? That she didn’t know how to handle all the emotions she was carrying around?

“It was fine,” she replied stiffly, her voice barely above a whisper. She dropped her backpack onto the couch and made her way to the kitchen, looking for something to occupy her hands. The quietness was unbearable.

Her father’s voice broke the silence again. “Dinner’s in the fridge. You’ll have to heat it up yourself.”

Hannah nodded without turning around. She didn’t even know if he was aware that she was starting to slip away—emotionally, mentally, and even physically. She wasn’t even sure if he cared.

Dinner passed in silence. She heated up the leftovers, picked at her food, and avoided his eyes. She couldn’t bring herself to tell him how much she missed the way things used to be. She couldn’t find the courage to let him know that she was hurting, too.

By the time the meal was over, her father had retreated to his room, and the house once again settled into a heavy, suffocating silence. Hannah cleaned up, absentmindedly scrubbing the plates, trying to distract herself from the pain that gnawed at her heart. She had stopped crying a long time ago. She had stopped reaching out for comfort because she knew there was none to be found.

The drugs came later.

She had resisted at first, thinking it wasn’t the answer to her pain. But the ache in her chest, the overwhelming sense of abandonment, made it so easy to turn to something—anything—that could give her a break from the emotional exhaustion that weighed her down. She started small—smoking cigarettes with the few friends she still had at school. But soon, that wasn’t enough either. One of the older kids at school offered her a pill one day, and before she even realized what she was doing, she swallowed it, hoping it would take her away from the silence, the pain, the suffocating weight of her life.

It did. For a while.

The high was fleeting, but it was all she could hold on to. For those brief moments, she felt numb. The pain, the silence, the loneliness—they all disappeared. In their place was a dull, peaceful void. She could forget everything for a little while. She could forget about her father’s empty gaze, her mother’s absence, and the hole in her heart.

But when the effects wore off, they left behind the same void. The same pain. The same silence.

And no matter how hard she tried to escape, it was always waiting for her when she came back down.

The night was quiet, but in her room, the echoes of her pain were deafening. As she lay on her bed, staring at the ceiling, she could hear the faint sound of her father’s breathing in the next room, steady but distant, like a ghost trapped in his own world. She knew that he couldn’t hear her pain, couldn’t see the weight she was carrying. And maybe that was the hardest part—the loneliness of carrying it all alone.

She closed her eyes, wishing for a world where things were different. A world where her mother hadn’t left, where her father wasn’t so broken, where she didn’t feel like she was sinking under the weight of it all. But the world she longed for didn’t exist. Not anymore.

Hannah took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Maybe tomorrow would be different. Maybe tomorrow she would feel something other than this crushing emptiness. But for now, she was left with nothing but the silence.

And the silence, in its own way, was the loudest thing of all.