My Silence

It is silent in my home. It has always been so.

The rooms rot slowly.

Days of damp turn the walls into slime. Days turn into years, and the wallpaper peels right off. Big curls of it slump down, exposing the streaky, mould-stained bareness behind. The dust is so thick and wet that it looks like ash.

Have I always been here? I don’t remember arriving. I don’t remember anyone living here. I just know that it is mine. Yet there is nothing to call mine except the bare walls and floors, the cobwebbed ceiling with one lightbulb, the hearth, and the windowsill.

Sometimes people come in. The last person I saw was a man who came to stick the sign back on the window: For Sale. Not long after he left, it came crashing down again. They stopped replacing it eventually. The last time must have been many months ago. I have my silence back now.

***

It is November. I feel the change of the seasons outside. October is crunchy, it is orange, it is fading warmth. It is the last embalming effort of the world, making itself look pretty for the goodbyes before the decomposition properly starts. November turns all that crunchiness to sludge. It dulls the colours. Everything is wet to the touch, like the old cellar of an ancient castle.

In November, the skies always give a beautiful, almost floral display before fading. I can see the pink, pillowy sky behind the silhouetted rooftops opposite me. The sun comes in a sharp, slanted spotlight. It’s not strong enough to do the bleaching work of a summer sun. It just fills the room with gold and shadows. Then, it dims. The sky turns yellow like a bruise. Then greenish blue. The street down below fills with car headlights, brake lights, and windscreen wipers. Invisible rain. Steel-wool sky within minutes.

I hear the door swing open downstairs. A crunch as the bottom of the door sweeps over an avalanche of junk mail. A creak and a slam. Then, I hear footsteps on the stairs. The floorboards shriek, and I hear the voices of men answering them.

Uh, so that totally fills me with confidence.

Well, if you fell through the stairs right now, we’d get like a million views, so . . .

Their laughter is loud. It echoes. It sears through me.

They clomp up the stairs until they reach my hallway. They throw open my door. Two men stand a few metres from me. I can’t see their faces for the hot-white glare of their head torches. They are in puffer jackets and weighed down with bags. Their torches sweep across my corner, my ceiling, my empty hearth, then over my window where it exposes the graveyard of flies and dusty tangle of old spider webs.

Their breathing is heavy. I can hear their every exhale, the way it rattles wetly in their throats and noses. I hear the way they swallow back mucus against the cold. I hear the meaty, dull thud-thud of their hearts. I hear the squelch of their innards as their meals nervously squeeze through their guts. The way their voices buzz and boom. It’s all deafening.

Fucking hell, the vibe in this place . . .

It’s definitely needing a good bit of TLC, that’s for sure.

The smell of them. I can’t just plug it up like they would be able to. Their smell is everywhere—all over me, a fug, like they dropped a heavy, wet bag over me. Not their sweat—the odours I smell aren’t necessarily odours. It is their everything. It’s sour, it’s rich, it’s earthy, it’s meaty. They roil with electricity and energy.

If there’s anybody in here, now is your chance to speak to us. Is there a woman called Mary Kennedy in this house?

Wait til we get the stuff out, man, so we can hear the answer.

They drop their bags and begin to clunk heavy items down on the ground. Loud, humming things that roar like the sea in my ears. Then, there are lights. They place them on the floor. The dust they have disturbed is in a frenzy all around them.

The men speak again.

I have to be very still to listen to them. I have to ignore the sensory overload and listen to their instructions.

This here is a Spirit Box. Use it to talk to us, Mary.

Speak to us. If there is anyone here, speak to us.

Say something. It’s your chance to speak.

Come closer to the Rem-Pod if there is anyone here.

Mary? Mrs. Kennedy? Speak to us.

I try to mimic them. I try to remember what it was to speak. I open my lips, and electricity crackles between them like threads of glue. It’s an effort to keep my jaws open and all that passes for a voice is nothing like the one I had when I was alive. I sound like the last breath of a strangled victim.

Hello? I know you’re in here. We just want to talk to you. Come on. Now is your chance to tell the world what happened up here . . .

Fucksake, man, there’s nobody here.

There is. Just give it time.

Nah, come on. This is bullshit. One last chance. Talk to us, lady. Talk to us. Come on. SPEAK!

He shouts. The sound explodes in me. I don’t have the same veins, tendons, blood, or adrenaline that he has, but I surge. I am a puddle that he’s slammed his boot down on.

Woah! Woah, woah, look! The Rem-Pod is going crazy!

A thing they put on the floor flashes. Colours dance. A static buzz. A shrill whine.

I find my mouth again. I find the black hole of it and where it falls away into the chasm tunnel of my throat. I dredge up something from within it, and I hurl it towards them.

BE QUIET.

The cacophony of their bodies is excruciating. Boots on floorboards, stumbling back. Hearts thud-thud-thud-thudding, adrenaline screaming. One of them trips over his bag.

Jesus fucking Christ!

It’s her! It’s definitely her!

Let’s get out of here, man! Fuck this!

Mary Kennedy? Is that you? Does the name Mitchell Kemp mean anything to you? You deserve justice!

I am splashed and scorched with what the living might call memories. The sweat of a man.  The last man I ever opened a door to. The solid density of him.

How fragile my wrists were.

LEAVE.

LEAVE ME ALONE.

GET OUT.

I am a whirlwind of noise. I am barely a form. I am tatters spinning in a gale. I send the lightbulb swinging like a hanged man. I snag on the nails in the wall, I swipe dust from the hearth, I scatter shattered bricks and plasterboard.

I don’t notice them leave. The next thing I’m aware of is pale November morning sunlight. I am back in my corner. I have reassembled.

I do not know yet if all my pieces have been returned to me. But I have my silence back again.