Silence Of A Robin

Chapter 1

Many people are under the misconception that I don't talk because I don't like socializing with others as I'm "too shy" or just refuse to engage in any sort of vocal conversation, which I suppose in some ways, that's true. I however, don't just stay quiet because I feel I don't deserve to, but also because even the expectation of having to speak to people in certain social situations will trigger me into a panic. Kind of like stage fright, except, a rather bad case of stage fright since the 'stage' is the entire world and my anxiety is my follow spot, which is really strenuous since that makes talking feel practically impossible.
Selective Mutism: according to the NHS is 'A severe anxiety disorder where a person is unable to speak in certain social situations, such as with classmates at school or to relatives they don't see very often.
They may avoid eye contact and appear:
• nervous, uneasy or socially awkward
• rude, disinterested or sulky
• clingy
• shy and withdrawn
• stiff, tense or poorly coordinated
• stubborn or aggressive, having temper tantrums when they get home from school, or getting angry when questioned by parents'.
I, quite frankly, most definitely come under all of these side effects. I mean I'm about as harmful and intimidating as blue butterfly and my 'temper tantrums' usually result in swamping myself in a fluffy blanket with headphones and Netflix- and I'm not stubborn; just strong-willed. It's just so much easier not having to acknowledge anyone, or more accurately, anyone acknowledging me. Which is ironic considering my Mum is a highly professional psychotherapist and nutritionist with a counselling business called 'It's Good To Talk'. Bet you wouldn't believe me if I told you I came up with that name, huh? Speaking of Mum, I should probably get out of bed now and get really for school, eww.
As if on que, my mum calls me from the kitchen to say that she's made me some tea. Although I'm not usually one for stereotypes, I one hundred percent, fulfil my legacy of being British with my Twinings, PG Tips and Digestive Biscuits which is another assumed misconception as I love food, my appetite just isn't exactly on average. My feet patter down the laminate floor boards of our apartment until I find my way into the kitchen where my mom and Ronnie have situated themselves at the kitchen island talking about 'Mum stuff'. Typing out a quick "good morning" message to my mum in my Notes app, I hand my phone over to her and she smiles at me whilst asking "having any breakfast, darling?" I take a sip of my drink and shake my head, no. She sighs and smiles weakly at me whilst pouring some granola into a bowl for herself. "I'll leave a banana out for you to take with you okay? You need to eat something! " My mum emphasises on 'something' and envelopes me into a comforting hug.
Ronnie greets me with a warm and welcoming smile whilst handing me my Disney Lion King mug. "Morning sweetie, Archie told me how much you love your beverages so I bought some honey & chamomile. It's meant to be good for the nerves" she winks and I carefully take the mug from her grasp and type out "Thank you, Ronnie, I really appreciate it :) xxx" into my iPhone and hand it over to her to read. "Awh, you're always welcome, my sweet." Chamomile in hand and bed-head glorious, I go back into my room and get changed from my over-sized t-shirt and put on my white top covered in pink, red, yellow and blue stripes with my denim dungarees over the flimsy material. After brushing my teeth, throwing my hair into a half-up top knot and applying some light make-up to my mediocre complexion, I text my best friend and soul-sibling of 6 years, Archie, that I'm ready to walk with him to school and shut my bedroom door behind me in the process of doing so.
"Archie said he'd be right behind me but that was 10 minutes-" and before his mother could finish his sentence, Archie stumbled through the front door almost tripping over his shoe laces "I'm here, I'm here! I couldn't find my wallet anywhere for shiiiii", to which Archie managed to catch his tongue before blaspheming in front of his religious mother, "for the shining light that Jesus used to help me find my wallet-love you mum, see ya Natalie!" Archie retorts rather quickly whilst pushing me back out the door and shutting it behind him so we could leave for school. However, I quickly run back to the fruit bowl in the middle of the island and grab a banana, keeping my word to my mum and give her a hug goodbye as she kisses the top of my head. "I love you sweetie, you're gonna be okay" she says only audible enough for me to hear. I give her a reassuring smile and a small wave, since I can't let her, Ronnie or Arch see how I'm really feeling right now and with that in mind, I close the door as we walk down the stairs to make our way to school.
"You really need to watch your mouth around your mum, yanno. She would freak if she heard you in school" I press send in mine and Archie's DM to which he scoffs after his notification goes off, reading my text. "Yeah, yeah, just cuz you've got auto-correct and a delete button to save you" he jokes; and to which I would've laughed with him too.
As I part ways with Archie since he's on the other side of the school to me, I reminisce on the days when I used to take Maya to school on the way to my educational prison hold. She'd run up to the school gates- but never before hugging me goodbye, and she'd run off to her friends in the playground without a care or worry in the world. She's always been the social butterfly; I'm the melancholy moth.
As usual, I walk down the halls of the tragic building I call school, averting my eyes from any of the other students, especially the ones shooting their glares at me in attempts to further damage my self-reliance (if that's even possible to make me feel any more insecure). It's been so long since I ever spoke and sometimes I wonder what it would've been like if I ever had the courage to talk to people...but I can't. I can't risk trusting someone again and having everyone I care about ripped away from me. I can't risk that satisfaction of him watching me suffer, knowing the depression and anxiety he put me in, take over again. I hold back the tears pricking in my eyes and cross my arms across my chest in attempts to stop them from shaking, still focusing my eyes to the square-tiled floor as if it was my new best friend. If only it could swallow me under so I didn't have to begin sixth form all together. Yet my feet subconsciously take me down the ever-lasting hallway anyway, despite my reluctance to do so, dragging my heels towards my new classroom.
The bell hasn't rang for tutor yet so I latch eyes onto the empty chair at the back of the classroom and make a beeline for it, slinging my mustard-yellow kanken bag off my shoulder in the seat next to where I'm sitting. I know, a generic bag choice but what can I say? I'm a sucker for 90's aesthetics. Honestly, I'd be lying if I said (excuse the pun) that I find it lonely spending so much time alone with my tenacious thoughts but my mental state has led me to compromise my social skills to a disconcerting minimum. Besides, no one will know my secret as long as I'm quiet right?
"Hey Ava!" My other best friend, Leila, greets me with her usual optimistic tone and snapping me out of my thoughts. She grabs a chair from the table in front of me and turns it to sit opposite me, reaching out for my hands and playing with my fingers. Leila's always been very "touchy-feely" since we were little but I don't mind a single bit though because she has always accepted me as a person, no matter what. Leila also knows my secret as well as Archie.
Leila's been my best friend since we were little kids. We first met when we were 4 years old at a local library that did this thing called Fun Club every week on a Tuesday afternoon for primary school kids to improve their reading skills and quietly write and draw (notice the emphasis on 'quietly' ). Even from a young age, Leila was into stories and writing; patient and determined to learn how to pronounce every word she read correctly through her magenta-coloured glasses with a little floral pattern on the sides. It was easy to tell who the more academically inclined one was out of the two of us. I however, found it more interesting to see how far I could leap down the isles and how fast I could pirouette- which at that age, looked more like a horrendous series of me spinning around in circles whilst trying not to knock any of the books off the shelves. Yeah...I don't think the librarian liked me very much.....
I take my left hand out of Leila's grasp to check the time which reads 8:45am and surely enough, the bell rings and old, familiar faces sauntered through the door looking like they'd just woken up about 5 minutes ago. These next two years should be interesting....
The majority of people have situated themselves in their self-assigned seating arrangements for the year, everyone chatting away to each other about their summer breaks and holidays and whatever other conversational topics that I'm not involved in. One of Leila's many friends, Tess,  walked through the door to which Leila noticed in a split second and called her over to sit with us although I know the 'us' will turn into Leila and Tess having a conversation of their own. Tess sets her black Lipsy handbag on the table and greets Leila and then they begin to, as I said before, have a conversation of their own. I reach into pocket to retrieve my phone and play this cartoon cat-stacking game which to be honest is a questionably odd remake of Tetris for feline-lovers to kill time.
Before very long, my new tutor who also happens to be my last years and this years English teacher, Mr. Hendrickson, is the last of us to rush through the cerulean painted door with paperwork leaking out his briefcase.
"I am so terribly sorry class. My youngest son refused to put his socks and shoes on for school and I knew he was going to make me late but I'm here and I need to take your register so if I just..." and Mr. Hendrickson leaves his sentence unfinished as he dives into his briefcase before a wash of frustration, confusion, and then closely followed an expression I can only identify as realisation paints over his face, slowly withdrawing his hands out from his briefcase with nothing in them. It appears that no one else was too phased by our teacher's early morning commotion besides me because Mr. Hendrickson notices this too and locks eyes with the only person in the room who is listening to him; me. Then before I know it, Mr. Hendrickson's silhouette is looming above my small figure, stress still shrieking through his eyes and raised eyebrows.
"Ava, you wouldn't mind me being a bother and ask you if you could write down everyone that's in here and take it down to reception, would you?" Mr. Hendrickson practically pleads me as if I have the authority to say anything other than yes. I nod and give him a reassuring smile to make it clear that it isn't any trouble to which he sighs in relief and thanks me before walking back over to his desk to set up for the day. Tearing out a piece of paper from my notebook, I jot down everyone's names  in our class with Year 12's one side, and Year 13's the other which by the time I'm finished, totals up to 27 names. I pick up the paper register and get up from my seat so I can make my way to the reception, taking my bag and notepad with me because I don't feel like I can sit in here for another 15 minutes and I don't fancy returning after my errand to the school office.
Keeping my head down and pulling the door handle, I slip through the gap between the door and the doorframe out into the empty hall. Or at least what I thought was an empty hallway because as I turn the corner with the school office in sight, I come face-to-face, well, more like face-to-chest with an off-white baseball shirt with grey sleeves which are merely visible to my current position since his tanned arms are covered by an onyx-coloured flannel shirt and a simple white grid pattern, much like math paper. I stumble backwards from impact but luckily catch my balance, scrambling to pick up my notebook that I dropped in the process only to see that it's being held out in front of me by the same figure I just collided into. That's when I looked at his face for the first time. His azure coloured eyes which complimented his dark, umber hair that appeared neatly tousled somehow...or something like that. To be honest, I'm not really paying too much attention anymore because that's when the unthinkable happens.

"Hi, sorry, I'm new here and the reception lady over there said that you would tell me where my first class is?" He asks sheepishly, his arm extended to point in the direction of the receptionist's front desk.
I'm frozen in place, unable to come to a resolution of how to get out of this situation without making myself look like a total freak in front of him. Oh, come on, Ava, it's too late to stress about that now, and it's not like I'm going to talk to the guy ever again anyway. So, before I can change my mind, I take my notebook from his hands and leg it for the nearest toilets to reevaluate the previous events that I like to call "social suicide". Forcing the door open with my side, I quickly whip out my phone and text the one person who will allow me to vent about my melodramatic inconveniences. Pulling up Archie's name in my contacts, I don't hesitate on clicking on his name.
"Arch, I'm gonna internally scream my lungs into oblivion. I just completely embarrassed myself in front of this new kid who asked for directions." But as I was about to hit send, I reread my words. Hmm, I guess it's not so bad. I mean, it was bad, but it's not likely that I'm going to see him again, is it? Not intentionally at least. I take my finger off the little green arrow above my keyboard and erase my message before I can contemplate the boy in the hall anymore.
The school bell rings for the second time this morning to signify the first class of today and I make my way to my first lesson as a sixth form student; Sociology. Squeezing my way through the crowds of students lingering around the corridors, I finally get to my classroom and make my way to my signature spot, aka, the back of the room tucked away in the corner. A few minutes pass and the teacher, who I am assuming could only be Miss. Walker as that is the name written on the PowerPoint behind her, begins the lesson by introducing herself, the topics we'll be covering throughout this course, and then instructs us to have a go at the first task that is now on the next slide of the PowerPoint on the interactive whiteboard. Just as I finish underlining the date and title in my book, a few students rush through the door, huffing and puffing as though they've just ran a tour of the school.
"Sorry Miss, we're transfers and went to the wrong block" one of the boys informs both for himself, and on behalf of the other students behind him, his low voice booming across the whole room. Miss. Walker dismisses the discommode as it's the first day back from summer break. I continue to write down the as many "dominant ideologies and beliefs" that I know which is in my favour since I love public speaking influencers and the analytics of behaviours in society. Happily minding my own business, I'm writing my ideology list when an unexpected voice utters above me.
"This seat taken?" a boy asks with an amiable smile plastered on his face. That's when I realize it's not just any boy, it's that flannel shirt boy again?! The serendipitous act makes me flinch as I wasn't expecting this so I just shake my head, no, and keep my gaze to the table in the hopes that he doesn't notice how flushed my face is out of pure embarrassment from our prior, little miscommunication underneath my chestnut skin.
"It's rude to ignore someone when they ask for help, ya know" he states in a matter-of-factly tone, referring to this morning whilst taking the seat next to me and I can feel him studying my face from my peripheral vision.
"Especially when they're trying to be your friend" he continues, to which I voluntarily look up at him for the first time so we can properly see eye to eye (and not face to chest). I raise my eyebrow at his remark only for him to sigh and open his pad of paper which looks newly bought.
"Wow, so not much of a talker, huh?" which sounded more like a statement rather than a question and I honestly can't work out whether that was an attempt to mock me or not but I'm not here for this. I close my book and I'm about to get up to move when I'm abruptly stopped by my new-found foe.
"No, no! Please, look I was just trying to make conversation, I'm sorry if I offended you". I stare blankly at him for a few seconds, contemplating him once again and his pleading, puppy-dog eyes before slowly descending back into my seat which seemed to please Flannel Shirt because when I looked back up at him, he had that awful, contagious smile on his face again. I roll my eyes and put my pen to paper; but he doesn't stop there.
"Look, you can hate me all you want, but at the end of the day, you're gonna be the one stuck with me all year" his lips curve into a smirk as if this is all some kind of game which makes me scowl even more.
"The name's Noah Christian Robin Sheffield, but people call me Robin". That's when realisation hit me like a truck and I try not to smile although I think he can already tell. I quickly get out my other notebook that I use to communicate with people and scribble on a new page to clear the air from confusion. 
"Seriously? As in like, Christopher Robin?!" Robin laughs through an exhaled breath and playfully rolls his eyes at me.
"Well obviously that wasn't my parent's intention" I shake my head in amusement.
"Yeah, yeah, if you say so, Bear".