Speechless

Chapter 2

Phil

Fifteen years old

Phil had been in high school for almost three years now and was hating every moment of it. He had assumed once he moved to secondary school people would have grown up a bit and have been nicer to him, but oh man, was he wrong. People always found a way to make fun of him now, whether it be because he said something that may have sounded a bit weird, because of his ginger hair, because they didn't like him, or because they had their own problems at home and took it out on him. It really didn't help that his hair was almost a fluorescent orange for the first few months of his new school, as he tried to dye his hair darker before he started and it backfired horribly.

Phil was now in year ten, had jet black hair and rarely talked to anyone apart from family members, his friend Peej and when teachers forced him to he spoke to them, or God forbid, did a presentation

Peej had moved to the school half way through year nine. Phil had no idea how he managed to become friends with the other boy, since he was the weird, quiet kid, while PJ was the new, interesting and creative one, but Phil was happy about it none the less.

***

"New research has come out at this point about the handful of people who have never had their soulmates first words appear on their wrist." Mr Gribbs, the science teacher, continued to drone on at the front of the class. "This new information still supports the fact that some unlucky people may just not have a soulmate, but also shows us that some of these people may have had a soulmate, but their soulmate may have died by the time they turned seventeen. More funding is still being put into the research so they can find more information and test subjects..."

Phil was struggling not to fall asleep. He would have found this a lot more interesting if his teacher didn't have the bad habit of speaking in such a monotone voice.

He looked over beside him, to his right, to see Peej completely zoned out and doodling different monsters and strange creations onto his note pad. In the centre of the page, a doodle of an octopus type thing with a sign in front of it and the letters OH drawn onto it seemed to be the main attraction of the page.

"What does OH stand for?" Phil whispered to Peej, snapping him out of his own little world.

"Oscars Hotel... It's nothing really, just a little idea I had in a dream last night-"

"Have you been listening to a word I've been saying boys?!" Their teacher barked at them, making them both almost jump out of their skin.

Mr. Gribbs stared at both of the boys for a moment before grumbling "What does it mean if a person never has writing appear on their wrist?!"

Phil immediately tensed up, all eyes in the classroom were now on him and he could feel his chest tightening by the second. "U-umm..." He managed to stammer out.

"It means they're a freak, doesn't it Lester!" Someone shouted from the back of the lab, but Phil couldn't tell who. All he could hear was his heart hammering in his ears.

"Oh, shut up Billy!" Peej cautioned, as he turned on his lab stool to face the back of the room.

Thankfully, the bell sounded throughout the school and all of the students were piling out of the door for lunch.

***

"Hey, are you alright?" Peej asked once he had caught up with Phil, who had practically bolted out of the classroom as soon as the bell went.
"I'm F-fine..."

***

Sixteen years old

Phil had almost completely stopped talking to anyone now, his immediate family (mum, dad and brother) being the exception and occasionally Peej, assuming that they weren't at school that is. He no longer felt safe at all talking in any public or social situations, as every time he had tried to speak his opinion in the past he either got shot down, made fun of, or he stuttered. It's not that he didn't want to speak to the other students, some of them were genuinely nice to him, it's just that he wasn't able to anymore. Every time he tried to speak to them, his words would become stuck in his throat and Peej would have to cover for him. Phil hated it. He wanted to be normal and to be able to go to school on the bus like everyone else without almost having a stupid panic attack from being completely surrounded by loud people and being crowded into a tiny seat. His mum now drove him to school every day and everyday he would sit, thinking about all of the pros and cons of going into the school, before actually walking in. That is if he didn't have a minor panic attack and have his mum drive him back home.

One day, Peej and his other good friend Chris, who Phil wasn't able to talk to, but enjoyed the company of, had come up with a slight solution for Phil being able to answer and talk to people while he was at school. A note book.

Peej had ushered Phil into the library during lunch time when practically nobody was in there apart from the librarians, and took him as far away from them as possible so he might feel comfortable enough to talk a little. Phil, to say the least, was confused about what was happening.

Peej took off his shoulder bag and took out a black, hard cover journal with white, decorated buttons pinned to the front of it and a pen in a piece of elastic on the spine. "Here, take this." Peej said as he handed the journal over to Phil.

Phil took it cautiously, examining the cover before looking back over to the other boy. "W-What is it-t"

"It's a journal!"

Peej smiled when Phil rolled his eyes "I f-figured-d th-th-that out-t..."

"It's so you can write down what you want to say, but you don't have to actually speak to anyone! See you can keep your pen in that bit" The other boy said as he pointed to the elastic strap on the side. "And it's small enough that you can take it everywhere with you, but big enough that you can write a lot of stuff into it before you'll need to get a new one! You can also draw in it and stuff if you get bored."

Phil looked at Peej with wide eyes for a few moments before replying with a small, warm smile "Th-thank you"