Adrianna Rodencal
Mr. Kristalyn
English 8
March 23, 2018
Silence
The only sound was the creaking of the front door as it swung open, slowly. There was no light besides the light trickle of sun that came in through the window. Nothing greeted Madeline. Nothing but dead, empty silence. The silence was warm, there was no chill down the spine or nerves set on edge by it. There was no dog nor cat, no television blaring the new shootings that were happening around the country. Just peace. Madeline had been in Omaha the entire day with her friend to go prom dress shopping for her last high school prom. Madeline’s sister, Lindsay, had decided to stay home.
“Unlike you some of us have homework,” Lindsay had stated with her hands on her hips before Madeline had left for the day. She had thought nothing of it at the time. Lindsay wasn’t one for social interaction even if she was with family.
Lindsay was the perfect child, straight A’s and liked by everyone in her class in 8th grade. She was beautiful. Her hair was the color of golden wheat and her eyes were emerald green identical to their mother’s.
Madeline’s feature structure was similar yet not the same she had been told that her eyes looked similar to mini galaxies, a mix of blue and green. The colors of her mother and father’s eyes mixed into one. Her hair was filled with natural highlights which were mixed with her butterscotch brown hair.
Madeline took a step through the doorway, placing her car keys in the dish that sat on the desk next to the entryway. She walked through the hall and into the open kitchen which opened up into the living room. Madeline turned the lights on casting a soft glow that filled the dark house giving it a warm, used feeling.
That was when she saw it. Something was stuck on the fridge; the fridge that was normally empty. The stainless steal of the fridge was always cold to the touch. A piece of paper was stuck on the front of the machine hanging ominously, waiting.
“What is that?” Madeline’s question was swallowed by the silence that was now cold as she walked towards the fridge. The light that had once felt warm now had the feeling of ice against her skin, stabbing. It was almost blinding as Madeline reached for the paper.
The note was stuck to the fridge by a magnet. The paper, white and unwrinkled, was folded crisply in half so that you couldn’t read the words without opening it. Madeline pried the magnet off and grabbed the paper. She very slowly opened the letter, her hands shaking though she did not know why.
The note was written very neatly save for the few circles of paper that were slightly crinkled as if water had fallen onto them. Madeline read through it and stood frozen. The paper fell from her hands, flitting through the air before landing on the ground in front of her feet. It seemed as if time had slowed down to a glacial speed and yet her thoughts still ran hot and burning through her mind.
“Lindsay?” Madeline’s voice broke through the barrier of silence that had held her. Only the small echo of her question answered from the vacant dead house. She could feel her heart racing, cold icy panic creeping into her already fogged thoughts.
“Lindsay!” She spoke again, time starting, quick and blurred. Madeline walked past the laundry room, then her parents room. Silence followed her with every step that she took it stood over her similar to death over the deathbed.
“Please no, please, please, Please!” Madeline stopped in front of Lindsay’s bedroom door it was shut, forbidding her from entering.
The beat of her heart echoed through her entire body. Madeline’s hand went to the door handle, touched it, the cool metal on her fingertips. She turned it slowly and pushed it open her eyes absorbing what stood in front of her. Rope, twisted and tied into the shape of a noose, hung from the ceiling. It swung in a slow menacing circle waiting but there was no body, only a chair stood beneath.
She heard the cry and then saw the body. Madeline saw Lindsay in the corner of her room as far from the rope as possible crying.
“Lindsay!” yelled Madeline and the little girl looked up at her, her eyes rimmed red.
Lindsay’s voice broke as she spoke her sister’s name, “Madeline?” She ran from the doorway where she stood, to her sister faster than she had ever run any race before. Madeline thanked God that her sister was alive and breathing, her neck not in the dreaded noose that now hung limp in the air.
“I’m here,” Madeline whispered into her sister’s neck, “I’m here. Everything is going to be fine.” Whether she was talking to her sister or herself she didn’t know, nor did she care.
Together they sat in silence, neither speaking, afraid that they would wake up to something worse. Images flashed through Madeline’s brain as she held her sister. Images of her mother… “This is my fault, all of this.”
Madeline didn’t feel the tears that ran down her face, didn’t know that she was crying until Lindsay brushed them from her face and with some effort smiled up at her big sister.
Madeline held her sister tight, brushing back the damp blond hair that she loved. She looked at Lindsay’s face, absorbing everything else about it, her mother’s green eyes, the soft smile. Their mother had done the same thing. Madeline hadn’t been lucky then but now, in the silence she could only think of one thing.
“Lucky, oh so extraordinarily lucky.”