Words Unspoken

Chapter One

The warm glow of summer sun fills Will's room. Late afternoon brings a quiet, serene house. Mom and dad reading novels on the back porch, Lily sitting with Oscar under the apple tree; Oscar filling up on apples that have dropped. In his room, Will wakes up slowly and softly. His room sparsely decorated, but matching his psyche. Only one poster hangs on the wall over his bed: a vintage Led Zeppelin 1977 North American Tour poster that his dad gave him for his 16th birthday. Next to his bed is his guitar on its stand and against the wall next to it is his keyboard. At the end of his bed are three stacks of books, all classic literature like The Odyssey, Hamlet, and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, those being among his favorites. The books were obviously bought in the used section of the book store, as the bindings and covers are worn and the pages are yellowing. A dresser and closet stand side by side facing his bed and books. His window sill on the adjacent wall carries three small pots of succulents, one dead but the other two thriving.

The plastic ceiling fan above his bed spins with a hum, circulating only the humid air, not quite making the room cooler. Will lies above his covers, sweating and dozing in and out of consciousness. He fumbles around until he reaches the plastic water bottle he left on his bedside table. As he sits up slightly to drink the warm water, he notices the wet imprint of his swimming shorts that he fell asleep in. His brown, fluffy hair has only half dried. He wipes some drool off his chin.

Now committed to being awake, he reaches for his phone at the end of the bed. Five missed messages. Two from Rob and Sam asking if he is free to play basketball later, one from his mom asking what he was doing, and one from Julia. He opens the last first. All she said was "hi" in response to his earlier text "hey." Quickly replying, he asks how her summer has been. He ignores the other texts.

Will walks downstairs, noticing the house smells like hamburgers. He reaches the back doors and sees his dad grilling and, without asking, he walks over and takes a finished burger, puts it on a bun, squirts ketchup on the top, and begins stuffing himself.

"Thanks, dad," he manages to get out between bites, small pieces of burger flying out of his mouth.

"Honey, that was rude," his mom calls, "we are eating those for dinner, not now!"

"But I'm hungry now and they smelled so amazing," he dances around his mom's chair.

"Knock it off," but she laughs while saying this.

Oscar runs up to Will, wagging his tail viscously.

"Hey, buddy! I know you are so excited to see me because I am your favorite. Isn't that right?" Will sits down with him, letting him lick his face and chest where he has dropped a bit of ketchup. Oscar's eyes widen as he just now spots the burger in Will's hands. Drool starts dripping onto Will's lap before he can even give the dog a bite.

"Don't feed him human food! We do not know if that is good for him. You are so mean!" Lily yells, running from the tree to where Oscar and Will sit, sharing the burger. Before she can reach them, though, Will throws the rest of the burger to Oscar and does a running dive into the pool. He lets himself sink to the bottom of the deep end, looking up at the distorted sun and sky. All the air in his chest releases. It is completely silent except for the air bubbles his breath just made. He closes his eyes and pictures her curly hair and light brown skin. Her perfect smile that makes her eyes squint. Just as he feels like she is right in front of him, he hears his mom and sister yelling above the water.

"What?" He breaks the surface of the water.

"We hate when you do that, it scares us," Lily pouts.