Silenced

by Leddy Harper

  Seven

  Rylee

  Kissing Killian was nothing new to me. He was the only boy I’d ever kissed, and even though he’d never told me, I was sure my lips were the only ones he’d ever tasted. I had to say though, he’d gotten a lot better since the first time. No longer did he press his mouth so hard into mine it made my lips and teeth hurt. He’d long since learned how to be gentle. And I’d never forget the first time he shoved his tongue into my mouth.

  I wasn’t even sure what he meant to do. But after a few tries, we figured it out. But now, it was so much better. I couldn’t help but compare then to now as he propped himself over me in my bed, his tongue melding with mine, his mouth swallowing my whimpers.

  We’d improved a lot over the last two years of making out.

  I was still the only one he talked to. He continued the silent game when it came to everyone else. At first, I didn’t understand why he couldn’t just tell people what had happened. They never did catch the guys who killed his parents and hurt him. But anytime I’d bring it up, he’d shut it down and tell me not to worry about it.

  My parents now knew about him. My dad had come home one evening from work—earlier than usual—and found me walking out of Killian’s house. When Dad questioned me about it, I couldn’t lie. Needless to say, I was grounded for a week. He didn’t know how to handle the situation, so we waited for my mom to come home. Of course, I never told them about Killian sneaking into my room at night, us making out, or anything about his past. As far as they knew, he was just Ms. Newberry’s mute nephew who’d lost his parents when he was eight. Once they knew his story, their attitude began to change, but they still didn’t like the idea of me being in his house without adult supervision. I wasn’t allowed to be alone with him in the house. And so far, I hadn’t broken that promise, because anytime he was in my room, they were technically home.

  Loopholes. They made the world go ‘round.

  Killian broke the kiss and rested his forehead on mine. This was usually the time he’d say goodnight and go home. After a few nights, I figured out why he had to leave, and it had nothing to do with being tired. His tented pants gave away his secret. We’d never gone further than kissing—although he did touch my boob once. I panicked and he stopped. Since then, we’d kept it to just our lips. Little did he know, when he left my room to go take care of his business, I’d flip onto my stomach and handle my own.

  It was a dangerous game we played, but neither of us seemed capable of stopping.

  I’d just started my freshman year of high school, and even though I was only fourteen, I had friends in some of my classes who admitted to already having lost their virginity. The thought of going that far with Killian made me nervous. I wasn’t ready. He was fifteen and might’ve been, but he never pressured me for anything. He said he was content with what we’d been doing. Although, it seemed to have been progressing toward something else. Slowly. I mean, it’d been two years. At this rate, by the time we end up having sex, I might be in college.

  “I hate taking a shower after I leave here,” he whispered against my lips.

  “Why? Isn’t that like the best part for you?” We’d become so comfortable with each other that my teasing no longer bothered him. He used to get embarrassed and his face would brighten into a fiery shade of red; however, now he just laughed at me. I think he liked it.

  “Well, yeah…I like that part. But I don’t like washing off your scent. I wish I could fall asleep with your smell on me. It’s not fair you get to lay here and smell me all night and I have to go home and wash it off.” He straightened his arm and pulled away from me.

  In the light from the flickering candle on my bedside table, I found my name scrawled across the inside of his forearm. He used to draw it there every now and then, but it seemed recently, he’d redo it anytime it started to wear off. Whenever I’d ask him to put his name on me, he always put it in a spot hidden by clothes. It would’ve been hard to convince my parents we were only friends if I had his name in marker on my skin.

  “When I turn eighteen, I’m going to get it permanently put there.” I loved the gruff sound of his voice. The first time I’d ever heard him speak, it was a bit higher, like the other kids I went to school with. But over the years, it’d deepened, and when he’d whisper-talk like he was now, it sounded abrasive and rugged. It did things to me. Things I shouldn’t have even known about at fourteen years old.

  “You don’t really talk about the future much. What are your plans? How will you work if you don’t talk?”

  He shrugged and then settled into the mattress next to me. I remained on my back, but turned my head to face him. “Hopefully, I’ll be able to talk by then. I don’t know what I’ll do for a job, but I’m sure there’s got to be something out there for me.”

  I giggled and pushed a few strands of hair off his face. Most of the time, he wore it pulled back, showing off the shaved parts underneath, but when he was in bed with me, some of the front pieces always fell out. “What do you mean you’ll be able to talk by then? You already can.”

  “You know what I mean, Rylee,” he said with a huff of air.

  “No…I don’t, Killian. You’ve never explained it. All you’ve ever said is you were told not to speak, so you don’t. You’ve mentioned finding your voice, but I don’t know what that means.”

  “They took so much from me. My parents, my childhood, my voice. I won’t let them win. Some how, some way, I’ll take back what’s mine. I haven’t even been back home since I left seven years ago. I’ve never been to their gravesite. Never seen their headstones. I was taken from my house on a stretcher, brought to a hospital where I stayed for weeks, then I was shipped off to live with other people. I was never given closure.”

  “So you plan to go back there? For closure? And then you’ll feel okay to talk in public?”

  He laid his arm across my belly and pulled me closer to him. “That’s the plan. I need to see it. I can’t explain it, Rylee, but I need to be where they are. I need to know they’re okay. There’s this fire inside me when I think about what those bastards did to my parents—this intense anger I’ve never been able to deal with. I just want to feel normal.”

  “I thought I made you feel normal.”

  He huffed and pulled his forehead to my shoulder. “You do. And then you don’t. You yourself, yes, you make me feel like I’m okay. Like I’m not living in the middle of some unsolved mystery. A never-ending crime drama where the murderers are roaming the streets and the victims are either six feet under or hiding out in his neighbor’s bedroom with a permanent smile on his face for the whole world to see. And then when I take a step back and look at more than just you, I realize I’m your secret. I’m Elise’s secret. I’m still stuck in this hole, the endless abyss of reminders. I need to escape that.”

  “You’re not my secret, Killian. My parents know about you. All my friends at school know about you. I don’t hide you. I’m not ashamed or embarrassed of you. You shouldn’t feel that way, because I don’t.”

  He pressed his lips to my bare shoulder where the sleeve of my shirt rode up. “I know. That’s not exactly what I meant. You may tell your friends about who we really are, but you’ve never told your parents. To them, I’m the pathetic boy who lives next door. The one you hang out with because you feel bad for him.”

  I rolled onto my side, into him, to fully face him. “Because if they know, this will all end. They’ve gotten more lenient with me since I’ve started high school, but if you think for one minute they won’t assume we’re doing stuff, then you’re wrong. Right now, they’re okay with us hanging out alone outside. If I tell them you’re more than a friend, they’ll probably find an issue with that and put an end to us seeing each other completely.”

  “And if you think your parents believe you when you say we’re just friends, then you’re wrong.” When he kissed me again, slow and careful, I forgot all about our conversation.

  “Killian,” I breathed out. “I don�
��t even know what in the heck we are.”

  “We’re friends.” He pressed his lips to mine again. “Who happen to make out.” Another peck. “In bed. At night.” He wrapped his arm around my lower back, which caused my chest to collide with his. “You’re the friend I think about in the shower.” His lips trailed along my jaw until they reached my earlobe. “And I’m the friend you think of when you have your hand between your legs.”

  I gasped and my face burned with the heat of a thousand fires.

  “Thanks for the confirmation on that,” he said with a peck to my flaming cheek.

  Pushing him away, I asked, “Do you plan on getting all the names of your friends tattooed on you? Right on your arms so everyone can see?”

  “Yup.” His smile took over his face and he wagged his brows at me. “You’re the only friend I’ll ever have.”

  “I don’t believe that for a second. I might be your only friend now because you’re homeschooled and don’t really go anywhere—because you refuse to talk to people—but I call BS that you’ll never have other friends for the rest of your life.”

  “No other friends like you.”

  I melted into his soft lips as they consumed mine.

  When he pulled away, he glanced over my shoulder at the clock on the nightstand. “I should get going soon. It’s after midnight. I’ve been here for over an hour.” His gaze met mine again, and something wicked glowed in the pools of shimmering green. “But before I leave…can you at least show me how you look when you think of me?”

  “No.” I pushed him away even more and tried to laugh through the embarrassment.

  “At least show me so I have something to think about in the shower. Are you on your back when you do it? Your legs up? Straight? You don’t have to actually do it; I just want to see.”

  I sighed, but relented, rolling onto my stomach. However, I kept my arms by my pillow so it wouldn’t look like I was touching myself in front of him. To my surprise, he leaned over me, practically pinning me to the bed, and blew out the candle. The room turned completely dark.

  He didn’t remove himself from me. Instead, he pressed his chest to my back and moved the lower half of his body to match up with mine. His hand pushed beneath me, between the mattress and the apex of my thighs—on the outside of my pajama shorts. I held my breath, unsure of what was happening, but not wanting it to stop.

  “Like this?” he whispered into my ear while moving his fingers back and forth.

  I couldn’t respond. My eyes were closed so tightly, light bubbles floated behind my lids. My breaths filled my lungs but never made it back out through my dry lips. His body began to move with his hand, his obvious erection in the crevice of my backside.

  I couldn’t think.

  Couldn’t speak.

  The only thing I could do was lift my hips and roll them into his hand. It took roughly thirty seconds for the explosions to rocket through my body. It was more intense than anything I’d ever felt before. No matter how many times I’d brought myself to this same place, nothing had ever felt as amazing as when he did it.

  He ground into me, his mouth falling to my shoulder and his face buried in my hair, and a rumble ripped through his chest. My body muffled the sound, but it reverberated through me as his arms and legs began to tremble. He’d gone completely rigid on top of me.

  Once the waves of a summer’s heat settled, he moved away, leaving me cold and alone. His whispered voice floated over me as he said goodnight and kissed me on the cheek. But I still couldn’t move. I remained on my belly, my face pressed into my pillow, while I heard him sneak out through my window. The screen groaned softly as he put it back into place.

  And then I was alone.

  My lower back was wet, my panties were damp, but inside, I was cold.

  I didn’t even know what to think of it, or how to handle what had just happened. So I closed my eyes, pulled my blanket to my chin, and laid there for however long it took before sleep pulled me in.

  “You know the rules, Rylee. Stay outside. I shouldn’t be gone long, so please don’t leave the yard.” My mom threw her purse into the car and waited for my acknowledgment. As soon as I nodded, she got in and closed the door.

  I watched as she backed out of the driveway, unable to meet Killian’s stare. It’d been four days since the night he touched me in my room. We hadn’t even spoken since then. I knew I’d been uncomfortable after that, and by his silence, I assumed he had felt the same way.

  As soon as her car rounded the corner, I turned to Killian, although I averted my gaze. “We should probably go sit in the back yard. I wouldn’t put it past her to circle the block and come back to check on us.”

  He followed me to the shade tree I often sat beneath. It was strange he didn’t hold my hand, considering he always held my hand. But I couldn’t put too much thought into it, because it’s not like I reached out for his, either. Awkwardness seemed to have wrapped us in its wings, smothered us in its cocoon.

  “I’m sorry, Rylee.” His voice sounded so grim. So deep and distant. “I didn’t mean to do what I did. I shouldn’t have.”

  “It’s okay. I didn’t tell you to stop.”

  “But it’s made things weird between us.”

  Finally, I glanced at him, finding his eyes settled on me. “It scared me.”

  Every emotion between fear and sorrow flashed across his face in a split second, and it nearly gutted me. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”

  I placed my hand on his bent knee for comfort. “No, Killian. You didn’t scare me. It’s not like that at all. It’s just…” I focused on my fingers while getting through what I needed to say. “When it was about to happen, I couldn’t think of anything other than it happening. And how much I wanted it. Then during it…I only thought about how good it felt. How I didn’t want it to stop. Nothing else entered the equation. But after it was over, I realized how dangerous it was. What if it’d gone further, and neither of us stopped it? I’m not ready for that.”

  He picked at my nail polish and pressed his lips together.

  “I just think maybe we got carried away,” I added.

  He cleared his throat, and I waited in fear of what he’d say. “I know. And I’m sorry. You go to school, around other people, so you get to figure these things out. I don’t. I feel like I’m learning everything as I go, and you’re the only one I’m learning anything with.”

  “Well…you’re doing a fantastic job for not knowing what you’re doing.”

  He smirked and turned to me. “I watch videos.”

  “You learned how to do that from a video?” And then I realized what kind of movie he was talking about. “Oh…you watch those?”

  His shoulder lifted in a lazy shrug. “Yeah. Is that wrong?”

  I thought about it, unsure of what to say. “I don’t know. I’ve never seen one before. A girl in my class said she found one in her parents’ room once, but she never told me what was on it. She said it was gross.”

  “Do you want me to stop watching them?”

  I met his gaze and paused for a second to appreciate the youthful quality in him. There were moments when he seemed so assertive—like the other night—times he’d utter things I assumed only grown men would say, and then moments like these when I realized he was just a kid, figuring everything out as it came. “No. You can watch whatever you want.”

  “I promise I won’t do that to you again.”

  I laughed and dipped my chin so he wouldn’t see the inferno blazing in my cheeks. “Don’t promise that. Maybe just say you won’t do it for a while…until we’re both ready for it.”

  His tone lightened with hope when he asked, “When do you think that’ll be?”

  “I don’t know…after I turn fifteen maybe?”

  He turned his attention to the sky and scrunched his face. “So in like…five more months? That’s doable. Not too far away.” We both laughed in unison. “I probably shouldn’t come back to your room before then, huh?”


  I hated the thought of not lying beside him for the next five months, but he had a point. There was no way I’d be able to turn him down if he came back and tried it again. I still felt the tingles of what he’d done to me…four days later.

  “That’s probably smart,” I concluded.

  “Can I still kiss you?”

  I turned my narrowed stare on him. “You better.”

  And then wisps of laughter seeped past his lips as they descended to mine.

  Eight

  Killian

  “Have you given any more thought to going to school this year?” Elise cleared the table after dinner, but I wasn’t done eating yet. She walked away from me, turned her back to me, as if she could’ve read my mind to get my answer. “It’s your junior year. I thought you might want to attend a real school for your last two years.”

  I sat in my seat and waited for her to face me again. She’d been doing this a lot lately, expecting me to suddenly start talking. She’d ask me a question, or just make a statement, but wouldn’t look at me to answer.

  Finally, she turned around and leaned against the counter. “Rylee wants you to attend school with her. She thinks it’s a good idea. And I have to be honest, Killian, I agree. You’re completely caught up to your grade level now, and you only have two more years before you graduate. I’d like to see you go off to college, get a degree, and do something with yourself.”

  Choosing to ignore her, I went back to finishing the food on my plate. She’d hinted at things before, and as of lately, she’d been trying to convince me to go to a real school. Rylee had mentioned it once as well, but I told her I wasn’t interested in being the freak. It didn’t matter what she said, she’d never be able to convince me I’d fit in with everyone else.

  I no longer hid myself away anymore. I’d go to the grocery store, run around the neighborhood, and even visited the library sometimes. I saw the way people continued to gawk at me, and I wasn’t interested in dealing with that on a daily basis. Deal with the other kids asking me questions, seeing the pity on teachers’ faces. Not to mention, I knew they’d make me learn sign language, and I refused. I knew I’d find a reason to speak again.