The Story of Silence (Book 3)

Chapter 5

Not going to bother stating where anybody is this time as it’s the same place as before, only the date has changed. September 1st, 1997:

Silence leafed through the paperwork on his desk. It was finally settled. His name was now for real, marked down in writing, Silence Mourner. The man at the office had given him a funny look when he had been told what the name was to be changed to. Well, it was a weird name to want to be known as.

Glancing over at the calendar hanging on the wall over the head of his bed he looked at the date circled in red. It was his birthday today and he was now sixteen years old. His birthday present from his uncle had been the change of his name. He’d helped Silence with it.

Silence rose to his feet, picking up his school bag as he did so and walked quietly down the stairs, being careful to not wake his aunt as he passed her room. It was 7:56 and she didn’t wake till eight. He wrote a quick note in a pad on the kitchen bench wishing her a good day and headed out the front door.

Sometimes he would walk to school, other days he would take the bus, today though he decided to walk. It was good for him, that and he didn’t want to be on the bus with all the rowdy children. He himself was still technically a child, but he could still call the others kids. There was nothing wrong with it.

He reached the large red brick building of the school early, he could tell because there was no-one else there. He didn’t mind though, it would soon fill up and he wouldn’t be alone any longer. That would be the time he would mind. He crossed the green lawn and stopped for a minute to wonder who had raised the school’s state flag. It was in the rules somewhere that whoever arrived first, be it a teacher or a student, they should raise the flag, so someone else must be here. He crossed the rest of the lawn and hurried up the grey steps and entered through one of the open brown doors.

Silence liked to be on his own. He could do a lot on his own when there was no-one to worry about. The problem with being alone though is that it gets lonely. But dem’s da breaks.

Actually, he liked to be with other people, but he didn’t get along well with most of the people at the school, so he liked to be on his own. It was all rather confusing, he didn’t think like this much, it hurt other people’s brains to get around what he thought.

He did have some friends though, you didn’t go to school for seven years and not become friends with someone. He liked to be around them, and they didn’t mind him.

He walked down the clean white hallway, which always reminded him of hospital hallways, except they didn’t normally have red lines at waist height running along the walls, to where his locker was; checking his watch on the way to see how much time he had before everybody would start pouring in. It was almost nine o’clock. If he hurried he would be able to put away his stuff and get to his first class on time before anyone else. He hated to be late and he always ran to a schedule.

He reached his locker and hastily stuffed his bag inside and started running just as the first crowd of teens started pouring into the school. He made it to his seat just minutes before the others filed in.

Silence liked his seat in the classroom; he got a view of everything. It was near the back and to the side, from where he sat he could watch as people walked in.

All the other students taking the class arrived, with the exception of two, a boy named Michael and his girlfriend, Jenifer. If one was late the other always was as well.

Though he didn’t pay much attention, he could hear the whispered comments about him filtering from person to person. Not all of them talked about him, but a few did. You’d think after a few years they would find someone else to talk about. But no, the boy with the weird name who doesn’t speak is always the topic of any conversation. It puzzled him as to why they had stuck to talking about him whenever there was nothing else to talk about. Was he really so different? Though going by the name Silence Mourner was bound to attract attention.