Sweet Sound of Silence

by Melanie Dawn

  WHAT WAS I supposed to do? Text her back and tell her how fucked up I’d gotten on my sleeping pills? Why the hell did she care anyway? What I did with my time was my business. Besides, I was fine now. I’d just had a little setback. That’s all. It wouldn’t happen again.

  My mother was sitting on a bench near my building when I got back to my dorm after storming out of the cafeteria. Just perfect. I’d been trying to ignore all the happy little families walking around campus, dismissing the fact that I’d be seeing them all weekend long. Even though it was the beginning of Parents Weekend, the last person I expected was to see my mother waiting for me.

  I saw her before she saw me. Legs crossed, she sat with her hands folded in her lap, looking at the ground. Hell, I hardly even recognized her anymore. Since Chloe’s death, she’d lost a lot of weight. She’d cut her hair because she’d said she just didn’t have the energy to fix it. She just wasn’t the same… then again, neither was I.

  She stood up swiftly when she saw me approach. “Ryder.” My name left her mouth with a soft sigh.

  I acknowledged her with a nod, but couldn’t bring myself to hug her. She dropped her outreached hands and tugged at her skirt to straighten it.

  With a shaky voice, she apologized, “Your father couldn’t make it today.”

  The mere mention of his name brought a scowl to my face.

  Reaching up, she picked an invisible thread off my shirt. “Don’t be angry, honey. He… he wanted to come for Parents Weekend. He just—”

  Brushing past her, I collapsed on the bench where she’d just been sitting. My mother spun to face me, wincing.

  “Ryder, please,” she implored, taking a step toward me. “Your father is hurting, too. He just doesn’t know how to handle all of this.”

  I rolled my eyes, leaning back against the bench and folding my arms across my chest.

  My mother sank down on the bench next to me, sidling up beside me. “It’s true. Hear me out, okay? You don’t see the look in his eye when he passes by Chloe’s room at night. You don’t see the way he stares at the little league trophies on your bookshelf. You don’t see the way he straightens your first-place art awards still hanging on your walls from middle school. He lost both of you that day, Ryder. Can’t you see that?”

  Grimacing, I looked away from her pleading gaze. A pigeon strutting around a few yards away captured my attention.

  “Look,” she declared, taking my hand. “I’m sorry. I’m so, so, so sorry. I expected too much from you. I realize that now. You were just a kid. I took advantage of you to babysit and help out around the house. I should have just let you be a teenager. You know,” she sighed, “what happened to Chloe… it wasn’t your fault.”

  I shrugged, still staring at the bird as it pecked at the ground. I didn’t want to listen anymore. I’d heard enough. Why the hell did she have to show up here, unannounced, and throw Chloe’s death up in my face?

  Mom must’ve felt me pulling away because she held me down with a tight hand on my shoulder. “Please, Ryder, listen to me. It was my fault. You know that. I’ve told you that a hundred times. If you blame anyone, blame me. It was me who rushed out the door that day and forgot to set the alarm.”

  I threw my mom a sideways glance, seeing the pain in her expression. Squeezing my eyes shut, I remembered the very moment I’d realized the alarm hadn’t been set. It was a feeling I’d never wanted to relive.

  My mother continued with a shaky voice, “It was my fault. Mine—” a sob escaped her throat, “—not yours.”

  Glancing at her as she wiped away the tears, I couldn’t help but swallow back the lump that had formed in my throat. What she didn’t understand was that, alarm or no alarm, it was my fault. I sat on my bed that day, playing that stupid video game, and completely forgot about Chloe. Completely. Forgot. I would never forgive myself for that. Ever.

  My mother leaned into me. “Please forgive me,” she whimpered.

  She didn’t even have to ask. Taking a deep breath, I wrapped my arm around her, pulling her against me. I wasn’t angry with her. Never had been. I wanted her to feel my love, even if I couldn’t bring myself to say it with my voice.

  She fell against my chest, clutching me. “I love you, Ryder,” she sniveled through tears. “We both do.”

  I felt my posture stiffen. If my father loved me, he sure had a strange way of showing it. Suddenly, I just couldn’t sit on that bench another second. I couldn’t listen any longer about how much my father supposedly loved me.

  I stood up, eager to escape the rush of emotions that were filling my chest. I flashed my mother a wistful gaze before leaving her sitting there on that bench and walking toward the entrance of my building. I wanted to tell her how much I loved her before I walked away, but my jaw clamped shut around the words. I could already feel the weight of my anxiety on my chest.

  “Come see us when you can,” Mom said, attempting to keep her voice light, as I swung open the heavy glass door. “You’re always welcome,” she called after me, just before the door slammed shut behind me.

  Welcome? That was a word someone used to a stranger, not to a son who’d grown up there. No, I would never feel welcome in that house again. It was where my demons resided. Where my worst nightmares came true. Where my father stared at trophies and fixed artwork, but would never look at his own son the same again.

  EVERY YEAR THE university hosted a family weekend to help parents get acclimated to the campus and to learn about all of the activities their sons and daughters had gotten involved in since move-in day. Mom and Chris had made arrangements to bring Zoe that Saturday. Family weekend was usually in the middle of September. It was long enough into the new semester for freshmen to get used to being away from home, but soon enough to not have time to get homesick yet.

  “Sissy!” Zoe ran full force from the car the moment her feet hit the ground. I picked her up to hug her, and she wrapped her legs around my waist, squeezing me tight.

  “I’m so happy to see you,” I told her.

  “I missed you,” she sang.

  I sat her back down on the ground and smiled as mom and Chris approached. Mom held her arms out for me and I barreled into them. I didn’t realize how much I missed her until she wrapped her arms around me. Her familiar scent enveloped me.

  “Oh, it’s so good to see you,” she declared as she clutched me.

  “It’s good to see you too, Mom,” I sighed, laying my head on her shoulder. “I’ve missed you guys.”

  My mother released me and stepped back. “Your father wanted to come, but his work sent him to Texas this weekend.”

  I shrugged. “It’s okay. I’ll just plan to visit him over Fall break.”

  Mom’s worried brow creased. “You’ve lost weight. Are you eating enough?”

  Nodding, I laughed. “Yes, of course. It must be all that walking across campus I’ve been doing.”

  Chris stepped forward, reaching out for me. He wrapped his arm around my shoulder, giving me a small squeeze. “No doubt you’ve been missed,” he said with a grin.

  I nuzzled into him. Something about Chris always felt so secure. Ever since that frightening night at Southside when he and mom came to my rescue, there’d always been an unspoken bond between us.

  “I’ve missed you guys too,” I told him, wrapping my arm around his waist. “Come on,” I coaxed them, “I want you guys to meet my roommate.”

  I greeted a few girls on my hall who were exiting the elevator as we were stepping onto it. The doors were closing just as I heard one of them say, “Oh my god. I think that was Chris King!”

  Chris sighed, realizing he would be forced to don the hat and sunglasses all day after all.

  Turning to mom, I raved, “You are going to love Gia. Her parents couldn’t make it this weekend. I hope you don’t mind if she hangs with us. I hate for her to be alone.”

  Mom shook her head. “Not at all. The more, the merrier.”

  Zoe reached up and slid her tiny hand into mine
, looking up at me sheepishly. I looked down and smiled. “I got something for you in my room,” I said with a wink.

  Her eyes lit up. “Really?”

  “I think you’re gonna love it.” I’d gone to the student store the day before and found a cute little elephant Beanie Boo wearing the university’s cheerleader uniform. It even came with a matching megaphone and tiny pompoms.

  Zoe raced ahead of us. She remembered where my room was from move-in day.

  “Slow down, Zoe,” my mom warned out of obligation, but the smile on her face proved she didn’t really mind so much.

  Gia opened the door and grinned at the tiny person bouncing around in front of it.

  “Hi. You must be Zoe,” Gia chuckled, welcoming her into the room.

  “Yeah, and I’m four,” Zoe beamed, stepping inside just as we reached the doorway.

  Gia looked up at Chris with stars in her eyes, but quickly regained composure. “It’s nice to meet you, Mr. and Mrs. King,” she greeted them, thrusting a shaky hand out toward mom and Chris.

  Mom bypassed her hand and went straight for a hug. “Please, call us Chris and Salem. Gia, we’ve heard so much about you. It’s great to finally meet you.”

  Chris smiled, “Very nice to meet you, Gia.”

  Gia’s eyes lit up the moment she heard Chris speak. The strong baritone of his voice caused most women to swoon. Gia was no exception. After all, Chris was a rock star legend. Although he’d taken a step back from the limelight, his music was still a driving force in the music industry.

  “I wouldn’t have made it these past few weeks without Gia,” I admitted.

  Gia’s cheeks flushed. I couldn’t tell if she was embarrassed by the compliments or just hot for Chris, but Zoe quickly stepped in and redirected the conversation.

  “Where’s my surprise, Sissy?” she asked, looking around the small room.

  “Oh, it’s right here,” I grinned, pulling the gift bag out from under my bed.

  Zoe reached for it and tore into it faster than lightning, pulling the small elephant from the bag. “A cheerleader Beanie Boo! I love it!” she exclaimed, clutching it to her chest and rocking back and forth with it.

  “What do you say to Alexis?” mom urged her.

  “Thank you,” Zoe said robotically, not even making eye contact with me. She was so engrossed in her new toy.

  “You’re welcome, sweet girl,” I told her, although she’d already shut out the real world and was prancing the elephant around in her own little imaginary world.

  Turning my attention back to my mom and Chris, I asked, “Would you guys want to take a walk around campus? Gia and I could show you around.”

  “Absolutely,” mom agreed, nodding.

  “Great.” Gia grabbed her keys from her desk. “We could show you the lake too. It has a nice walking track around it. That’s where Alexis likes to jog. I’m way too lazy to get up that early though,” she chuckled.

  Mom knew my obsession with running. It cleared my mind. I’d tried to make it a daily habit. Gia had made napping hers.

  “Let’s go,” Chris suggested, sliding his sunglasses off the neck of his shirt.

  As we made our way back down toward the elevator, he flipped his ball cap around on his head. He’d been wearing it backwards, but now tugged the bill down on his forehead. Sliding his sunglasses onto his face, I knew he was just trying to hide his identity. We both knew a mob of sorority girls clamoring for pictures and autographs would ruin our quiet family time on campus.

  We enjoyed a peaceful walk across campus as I pointed out the buildings where my classes were held. We stopped in front of the bell tower in the center of campus to snap a few family pictures. Zoe proudly held her elephant up in all of the pictures. It was just so nice for all of us to be together again. I’d missed them terribly.

  As we made our way down to the pond, Zoe raced ahead of us down toward the water.

  “Be careful, Zoe,” Mom called after her.

  “Okay, Mommy,” Zoe’s voice echoed in the distance as she ran toward the edge of the pond where a flock of ducks was floating. As soon as they saw her barreling toward them, they flew off and landed closer to the center of the pond. Zoe squatted at the edge of the water, introducing her stuffed animal to a bullfrog sitting on a nearby rock.

  Her giddy laughter rang out as the frog hopped off the rock and plopped down into the water.

  We all found a picnic table and sat down to chat about how the first few weeks of classes had gone while Zoe played nearby.

  THE SINGLE PILL I’d taken, long after I’d left my mother standing in the cool evening air, hadn’t touched my insomnia. Plagued and frustrated, I’d tossed and turned all night. I’d spent most of the wee hours staring at the ceiling. When I finally got out of bed, I felt like the walls were closing in on me. I decided to take a long walk to the pond and hoped the peacefulness would relax me.

  The weather was nice enough that I decided to sit down for a while. I pulled my sketchbook out and had found the perfect tree to sit under. Leaning against its trunk, I stared out over the pond to see if I could find some inspiration to draw. Before long, I was sketching the clouds onto my pad. There was just something about my charcoal pencils and a blank pad of paper that calmed my thoughts. Art helped me grieve. It provided me an escape, just like the sleeping pills, from the pain of losing her. I would sketch her face from memory, and for a brief moment, it made me feel closer to her.

  I was blending the lines of the clouds when a little girl’s laughter caught my attention. I glanced up over the rings at the top of my notebook just as a set of beautiful brown curls bounced past in the distance. She giggled again and squatted by the water’s edge.

  The little girl looked an awful lot like Chloe.

  Surely my mind was deceiving me.

  From a short distance away, a mother’s voice called to the child, but all I heard was, “… oe…”

  Chloe?

  I looked again, noticing the tiny gray elephant in the little girl’s hand as she played by the water.

  Oh my god. Peanut! Chloe! My heart began to race.

  Just then, she stood up, turning her head slightly so that I caught a glimpse of her face.

  Not Chloe.

  I shook my head of its dizzying fog. You’re losing it, Hawkley.

  But there was something about those sparkling blue eyes that looked familiar. I took a deep breath, trying to refocus on my drawing as the little girl continued to play by the water’s edge. My body tensed every time I heard her giggle. She’d dip her toe in the water, risking the chance of falling into the water, and I would feel my chest tighten. It was only a few inches deep at the edge, but as I was painfully aware, a child that small could fall face-first and panic in an instant.

  Every few seconds, I’d catch myself glancing up and watching those sweet curls bounce as she skipped and played with the elephant she kept referring to as “Lucy.” I got lost in my thoughts, drawing and sketching the picture of Chloe from memory, using those swishing curls on the little girl as inspiration.

  Before I knew it, a tiny voice was beside me. “Hi.”

  Startled, I snapped to attention, realizing the tiny voice belonged to the adorable girl by the water. I turned to look at her, her bright eyes staring up at me with wide-eyed wonder.

  Pointing at my sketch pad, she asked, “Is that my Lucy?”

  I returned my gaze to my drawing, noticing the tiny elephant I’d sketched into the hand of my sweet Chloe playing by the pond… just like Peanut, the same one that she’d left laying by my door the morning of her accident.

  “Is that me?” the sweet girl asked, not minding that I hadn’t answered the first question yet.

  I peered back at her, in awe of how much she reminded me of my precious sister.

  Just then, she reached up and swiped a tiny finger across the lock of hair that had fallen across one of my eyes. My stomach tensed. Embarrassed, I tried to avoid eye contact with the angelic child.

  Sh
e didn’t seem to care that I hadn’t yet spoken. With furrowed eyebrows, she said, “You look sad. Are you sad?”

  Ah… gotta admire the brutal honesty. A deep, ragged breath reverberated in my chest. My eyes burned as I blinked hard against my pricking eyelids, and I stared down at the pencil in my hand.

  “My mommy says it’s okay to be sad sometimes,” the little girl sighed, placing her tiny hand on my shoulder. She smiled, warming my insides with her sweet, innocent eyes. Then, as if someone had flipped a switch inside her, she skipped away calling over her shoulder, “Just not for too long, okay?”

  She talked excitedly to her family about her adventures with the frog down by the water’s edge. Peering around the base of the giant tree to get a glimpse of the family as they were leaving, I recognized Alexis’s smile right away. I knew there was something about that little girl’s blue eyes that looked familiar. That must have been her sister.

  Just then, I noticed a tiny gray elephant trunk propped up on the toe of my shoe. Picking up the stuffed animal, I waved it around and tried to get the little girl’s attention. I wanted to let her know that she’d left her elephant lying there. She peeked over her shoulder and saw me. Instead of running back to get it, she just flashed me a sweet smile and gave me the thumbs up sign. She seemed fully aware that she was leaving me with it.

  Touched by the young girl’s sweet gesture, I stared down at the tiny elephant in my hand. The big, innocent eyes of the Beanie Boo stared up at me as if to say, “Don’t worry. I’m here now.”

  I glanced toward the heavens. Chloe knew just what I needed today, and she’d sent it in the form of a little girl with bouncy curls and a stuffed elephant.

  Thank you, Peanut.

  MY MOM HELD Zoe’s hand as they walked down the path, away from the pond. “Who was that boy you were talking to?” she asked her.

  Zoe glanced back toward the tree, giving the thumbs up sign. “It was just a sad boy,” she sighed. “But he’ll be okay now. I left Lucy there to help him feel better,” Zoe beamed, proud of herself for helping a stranger.