Exposition.

Silence.

I ponder of something terrifying,
'Cause this time there's no sound to hide behind.

-Car Radio, Twenty One Pilots.

*

Usually, when Sam's parents fought, she'd plug in her headphones and put on her loudest music to drown out the voices. But this time, for some reason, the prospect of having to listen to Checkmate made her want to empty the contents of her stomach onto the polished hardwood floor.

So she ran.

They wouldn't notice her absence, anyway. Their arguments normally lasted for at least thirty minutes, after which they generally went back to ignoring each other, but today, if the intensity of their voices was anything to go by, Sam had at least forty five minutes to herself. Forty five minutes of pure, blissful silence.

She ran till she was breathing in sharp gasps. She ran till the burn in her calves shouted over the echoes of her parents' voices. She ran aimlessly, with no specific destination in mind, and when she finally stopped to catch her breath, she noticed that she had reached the boardwalk.

The popular hangout for kids her age was deserted at this time of the night, and the lake was still enough for her to be able to see the reflection of the full moon. Sam sat down at the edge of the boardwalk, and let her legs hang down and skim the surface of the placid water.

Finally, some peace and quiet.

Until the floorboard behind her creaked, and Sam twisted around, (it could've been an axe murderer, for all she knew) and socked the poor guy in his thigh.

"Ow! What was that for?"

"Jeremy? What're you doing here?"

"I just saw you running here like a fucking maniac and decided that it would be the perfect time to take advantage of you."

Jeremy Monteith, more commonly known to the whole school as the guy who once emptied a bottle of pink dye in the swimming pool, was easily the most annoying person Sam knew.

He was also her best friend.

Sam cocked up one eyebrow, pursed her lips, and gave him her tried and tested are you kidding me right now look, which had been known to make grown men cry.

"Fine", Jeremy sighed. "I came to see if you were okay. You can talk to me, y'know. We're, like, best friends and all." He nudged her with her foot, and Sam scooted over to make some room for him. He sat down next to her, and said, "So Samantha, whaddaya wanna talk about?"

Sam never spoke to people about anything. Ever. Even if she'd discovered a plot to crash the Earth into the sun, she'd keep her mouth shut and convince herself that it wasn't such a big deal anyway. The fact that she managed to laugh off her problems, make them look smaller than they actually were, and ignore them until they went away didn't exactly help, either.

But seeing Jeremy so enthusiastic about trying to help her made her heart melt and her stomach tighten with happiness (that was probably gas, though. That burrito bowl at lunch looked a little suspicious).

So she told him. Everything. She told him how her parents couldn't go a week without going at each other's throats like rabid dogs. She told him how they often dragged her into their arguments, making her pick sides. She told him how she was sick of it all, how she wanted to just run away sometimes, free from everything

It was a little uncomfortable at first, but Jeremy was surprisingly quiet and unobtrusive throughout her rant, and the initial awkwardness of I'm actually talking to someone about something that troubles me eventually gave way to a sense of liberty.

And that was when she realised that she didn't want silence. She just wanted someone to listen while she filled it with words.

*

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