Eureka! Alright, so I'm walking home from the PX (Army talk for general store) and I just I dunno, thought of this lil' story. And I am really hyped about it! I have sections of this story already in my head, I'm really psyched about this! Alright so…I guess I'll start~!
It wasn't raining that night, in fact it was quite sunny, despite the severe cold that was sweeping across the state of Ohio. I always thought that if something happened that would change my life, the sky would be streaked with raindrops. Granted, gray clouds splotched the sky, but drops of rain did not fall from them, rather flurries of snow. On the day that I lost my speech, the sun was bright, as if the ball of light was laughing at me, as if it found some sort of joy from this.
There is no heart-pounding suspense story as to how I could no longer speak, I just woke up and couldn't. In a way, I expected it. My whole life I have been a mere shadow of my brother. Born twins, and yet it was like only Alfred had been conceived. Of course my parents and brother noticed me, and most of my teachers, but as much as they remembered they also forgot. Mr. Borden would not even call my name on the roster most days, Mrs. Kingsley wouldn't hand me a test, and Mr. Cons would count me absent every day until I would speak. If he heard me that is, which most days he did not because of the whisper I was born with. My volume never exceeded that of maybe a rats squeak, it was simply the voice I was born with.
Back to my recognition, I didn't mind the teacher's it became routine really. However it was when my mother and sometimes even my brother forgot that it hurt. I never hated them for it, I couldn't find myself to do so. In fact I blamed myself, I blamed my whisper, I blamed my shyness. After a while I blamed even my own existence. I never threatened my own life, that thought never even crossed my mind. I loved this world too much to leave it. However, I did realize that although I lived and breathed there was no meaning to it. There was no reason for my existence. I didn't sulk in this fact, I just realized and accepted it. Although I would question this fact often when my father would recognize me.
I loved my father greatly, not just because he never forgot, and not just because he constantly reminded my mother and brother that I even existed, but because he was the one who told me every day that my life held great meaning. He almost convinced me that what he said was true, but his belief never beat mine.
Five months and eighteen days after my brother and I turned nineteen, my father's and mother's life were taken on the streets of Ohio. Both were robbed and then shot by a homeless man. The man was found a month later in the neighboring alleyway, starved to death despite gorging himself after squandering my parent's money on feasts of food. I found this out years later. That day as well as the day of their funeral was sunny as well, the first time I realized the gaseous star took joy in my sadness. Neither I nor my brother cried as their bodies entered the ground, we were raised to never shed tears because to do so could only deface you. It was when I returned to my apartment that I went against my parent's teachings. My sadness could no longer be contained and the tears flowed from me for hours. All I could do was lay on my poorly constructed mattress and clutch my knees, weeping. The next day I went across the street to visit my brother, see if he was doing better or worse than I. But when he opened the door, his eyes looked past me rather than on me. His eyebrows had furrowed and he turned his head left and right, searching for something. I opened my mouth to speak when he closed the door. I stood there , mouth agape for minutes that seemed like hours to me, trying to comprehend what had just happened. It was as the sun loomed over my head that I realized, my own brother had forgotten me.
Since my father was no longer around to remind him, I had become completely translucent to my younger sibling. I ran to my poor excuse of a home and did what I did the previous day, cried for hours. This time I screamed, which from me was equivalent to the volume of the low rumbling of a car engine while in park. I still couldn't hate Alfred, and was slightly shocked when I found that I wanted to. I was just confused, I wanted answers from him. I didn't understand how it was possible for a human life to go on completely unnoticed, especially one that you have lived with your whole life. We had only been separated since the day we turned nineteen, and even then my mother and father required us to visit every weekend. But now, there was no reason for him to remember me.
A week later, I finally left my apartment, food needed to be bought and I needed a job if I planned to pay the end of the month's rent. And apparently to feed myself since I found only enough money to buy a couple loafs of bread, a little lunch meat, and a couple apples. I was completely silent when the cashier sat there playing with her nails even though I had lain my food on the belt as loudly as possible and tried to speak to her several times. The silence remained as I left after going to the self check-out.
The day after I fed myself I set out to find some kind of job, I didn't care what kind, as long as I got paid I didn't care if I had janitorial duty. But my efforts went in vain as the same story continued. I could punch someone square in the face (though I could never have the courage to do so) and they wouldn't bat an eyelash. I went to numerous places in search of a job, but it was useless, a voice was never heard from me. I was getting tired of it, and I returned to my home in despair. No job meant no money, there would be no way to buy food or even pay rent. I knew living a life on the streets would be inevitable.
I lived the next week in fear, the end of the month approaching. However, when it came there was no foreboding knocking on his door by the landlord. In fact there never was, I lived in that apartment as winter was welcomed throughout Ohio. The chill crept through the room and into my bones, a couple of sheets were not enough to keep me from shivering. In mid-December my food supply had run it's course and I was beginning to grow hungry. And then Decemb 26th, the day after Christmas, the dreadful knocking on my door was heard. I pretended I couldn't hear it, a pressed my pillow to my ears, trying desperately to block the sound. And then I heard wood splintering and I unshrouded my sight to find my door shattered. The landlord barged in and was searching the room, of course he never saw me. I was just a crinkle of the sheets and a dent in a pillow to him. I watched in horror as the thirty year old man emptied my apartnment, grumbling. He apparently thought someone checked into the room and just left so that person didn't have to pay him squat. Unbeknownst to him, the owner of the room was trying desperately to stop him from throwing his belongings out the back window, into the open dumpster.
And it was that day that I found I could no longer speak. I was trying to tell the man to stop, I tried to scream, shout, do anything to stop him from destroying my home. But nothing elicited from my mouth, no sound would come out. My hand flew to my throat, it wasn't sore I had found. When I think about it, it was probably because I had lived four months without speaking, because I didn't have to. It was something I no longer needed to do, so I simply lost the function. By the time I had realized this, the room ad emptied and a small family of three were beginning to set their belongings in what was once my home. I had no choice but to leave.
So I left, hungry and the cold seeping into my ribcage. My body shivered violently and I could almost feel my fingers changing color. I walked along the white blanketed streets for hours and finally stumbled into an alleyway, my vision beginning to splotch black. And this is when I began to recount everything, as I slouch against the cold brick wall and my tattered pants begin to dampen from the slowly melting snow. And now….I can feel the silence…it's deafening….