How to Survive a Host Club | OHSHC

Silent Screams: Epilogue

Third Person POV

Cold. Warm.

Clammy hands. Dry throat.

Unwilling. Unable to help herself. 

Silence throbbed in her ears, pounded out a noteless symphony inside her head. No sound. No words. Nothing penetrated the hefty wall of silence that had been built without notice around her. It was suffocating and, at the same time, the only thing that kept her breathing.

The world had faded into shades of gray. Stark whites and somber blacks stood out amongst the blend, but no other colors shone through the dull sheen.

Except her eyes. Those pools of melted chocolate, once full of comfort and love, now shallow and apathetic. 

Her skin was sallow, bordering on a sickly yellow - no longer the rich olive tone of her ancestors. Black clumps of hair fell about her shoulders, clung to her forehead, frizzed out abover her head. No gloss, no shine. She'd lost weight - too much to be considered healthy. 

The silence buzzed as her broken eyes slid around and fell upon her daughter's quaking form.

The word "Micah" was on her lips, a wisp of a memory, a wisp of a girl - but no sound. Not a syllable escaped her chapped lips. 

The girl had no choice but to ghost forward on numb legs, her steps unsteady. Warm, bitter tears welled up in her mismatched eyes. No - she'd promised herself she wouldn't cry. But looking at her haggard mother, seeing how erratic her breathing was, how dark the circles beneath her eyes seemed in the dim glow of the hospital room, how her hands grasped at the thin white blanket covering her no doubt withered legs - all bets were off.

Micah settled herself gingerly on the side of the bed, smoothing out the wrinkles in her skirt. Papa had told her it didn't matter, that her mother would never care about appearances when it was just them alone together. It didn't matter. Micah felt awkward - for the first time in her sixteen years - in front of her mother; fixing her disarrayed clothing was the one factor she could control.

Her eyes glided over the various medical equipment that occupied the space besider her mother's bed. Flashing lights. Zigzagging lines. Surely there was beeping (there was always beeping on the television shows she used to watch), though her own ears were deaf to it. Could her mother hear it? Could she hear the thundering of her heart? Or was that even an issue anymore? 

When was the last time she felt her heartbeat?

She could feel the presence of her father, waiting just outside the door, ready to intervene should her emotions take a plummeting nosedive anytime soon. She wouldn't need him. She couldn't need him. Not when... it was just her and Mama.

The sterile white of the room was overwhelming. Why was everything so clean, so precisely neat and orderly? Why couldn't there be a splash of color somewhere, anywhere? Were there healing attributes found in the blank color? No. That was ridiculous. Or was it? She wasn't sure, didn't care to find out. It didn't change a thing about her mother's situation.

Micah tried to break the silence with a soft-spoken hello, but one look at her mother's glassy, unresponsive eyes, and her tears fell, spilling over her lashes and cascading down her fair cheeks, which she now realized she'd inherited from her father. What did she have from her mother? Both parents had raven hair, so it was inevitable she'd have it as well. But from her mother, what did she possess that was singularly hers?

Warmth enveloped her hand, jerking her from distant thoughts. She curled her fingers around the hand that held hers, tightly, so tightly. What she wouldn't give to keep that hand forever in her grasp.

Brown eyes met emerald and crimson. Apathy met agony. Confusion met hysteria.

There was so much she wanted to say, so many words, carefully articulated and perfectly poised, that screamed to form on her tongue and vibrate her vocal chords. However, they were trapped by the choking sob closing her windpipe. She couldn't speak, couldn't hear. And with the molten tears in her eyes, her vision was blurry enough to consider her legally blind.

There was only that steady, rhythmic warmth on her hand that told her she was drowning in reality.

Micah.

Two syllables. A word. A name. Her name. It fell from craggy lips, whispered through the air, shattered the silence. 

Her voice. She shared her lovely, lilting voice.

Micah didn't care that in her current state her mother might not appreciate the tulmult she was struggling through, didn't care that she might not remember the love she felt for her daughter. All that mattered was the fact that she could cry, and that when she fell against her mother, two wilting arms held her to a jumping heartbeat.

As the silence closed around her once again, shielding her from the agonizing screams of her own design, she felt a smile against her hair. Three words slipped beneath the barrier of reticence:

I love you.

A declaration that swept away all her fears.

A sentence that quieted her racing heart.

A goodbye that made her tears burn more fiercely than the sun.

the end

"The story of life is quicker than the wink of an eye, the story of love is hello and goodbye... until we meet again."

-Jimi Hendrix