Listen

**This story has nothing to do with the theme of the prompt. It ties into my other story "Color." Thank you.**

He knew I would listen.

Innocence is a silly thing. I am pure, the purist; but I listened. I sat and listened until I didn’t exist in my space anymore but in his, in that moment, in his creation. He created me, he created her.

We are innocent.

She listened, I listened, we listened together in his silence. It was the only thing that had the courage to speak, the thing that condemned us both, killed us.

I listened.

I hear all sorts of things. I can hear how many ants scramble from beneath his feet. I can hear my mother’s heartbeat when he comes home; such a panicked rhythm. The whole house grows fearful and dull like its own life will be sucked away by his presence; but then everything grows quiet and that’s when I hear the most.

I listened to my humming bird die.

 I was little but I remember the hummingbird who would hover above my window seal every morning, it’s wings beating fifty-three beats per second. It was if time slowed down and allowed me to experience the rhythm my hummingbird wished for me to hear and I would. I would listen every morning, every fifty-three beats per second but it was one dreadful morning where I found myself counting down. Fifty-three, fifty-two, fifty-one; each beat growing weaker. It was on the last beat where I heard it; the silence that spoke death.

Death is a silence everyone can speak.

He speaks it so well; death. He is the reaper and I am his child so I listen. I listen in silence and I hear the leaves slowly lose their color when he walks past and I hear the wind separate when he stands in its path. I hear the birds stop breathing when he peers from afar; he killed my hummingbird.

Fifty-three, fifty-two, fifty-one.

I listened.

The car-ride. The house tucked away in the middle of nowhere. His footstep along the cement driveway. His reflection in the long glass window. I heard it crawl from within him, the evil thing that possess his humanity, the thing that is him.

He silenced me.

I can hear death; it is my innocence. I am innocent. I did nothing but hear her silence. She wanted to die, I could hear her soul beg him, plead with him to kill her. Her sick soul loved every minute of it as did his. His soul danced with hers as she lied there, they dragged their feet and hands through her pooling blood and smeared it everywhere. I heard her face creep into a small smile as her life dulled into his version of life. It was such an awful thing to hear.

I cupped my hands over my ears but the sound of her bones breaking in his jaws was too harsh. Her soul, herself, she did not scream. She could feel my fear as could he; I was involved with their dance. A bystander who was never supposed to be there. They both killed me, strangled me. Her smile grew bigger as the final light faded away in her eyes and into his body. I laid with her, tangled in her blood. I was silenced but I heard his footsteps come down those step.

Fifty-three, fifty-two, fifty-one.

He walked out the way he came, a jingling sound from clunked metal came from his pocket. There were three things that were left behind. His soul, her soul and mine.

He opened the car door, sat down, and gave a small hint of a smile. No It wasn’t directed at me but was directed at nothing. He is happy, he is lighter; it was like he had to do this on order to feel this way, to not feel so heavy.

I listened.

It was a beautiful silence we shared; a comfortable one where it felt like he is my simple loving father and I am his innocent quiet child but that is far from the truth. The truth lies within our home; it lies within the woman’s home. It lies within the squeaky floorboards and his heartbeat. The truth is his soul will return to him and make him heavy again. He will return and he shall be heavier because the woman will be with him too. The truth is, I will be heavier.

When my hummingbird died a little piece of me died and it grew heavy within me. It’s a heavy shadow that knows what death is and it goes to sleep with me every night and wakes with me every morning. The truth is I am heavy like my father even with my soul intact. I know a part of me which has died enjoyed every moment of hearing her die because it becomes a mutual relationship once you have been introduced to death. It becomes a heavy relationship.

The truth is I listened.

His silence is my silence.

His insanity is my insanity.

The floorboards will be lighter, the air around our home will be less thick, and the silence we share will be mutual. I will crawl in my bed and begin my count: fifty-three, fifty-two, fifty-one. I will hear his feet quietly sneak around the house until he reaches the back door where lies a window that lets him peer out into our back yard. I will take a deep breath as I hear the dead bolt slowly click back into the door and then I will hear his footsteps. They will grow heavy as he reaches his shed that’s tucked away in a corner of our yard and has many locks. He will stand there, possessed by his soul who has reentered his body and then he will release a breath that should only be heard by ghost. He will then unlock the large wooden door that keeps his prized possessions safe and away from people who wouldn’t understand. He will drop one necklace, one ring, and one bracelet in an old red painters bucket and drop it with the other countless things he had to take. He then will sit there for hours waiting for that feeling to come back, the feeling of wanting to be light again.

 I will close my eyes and hear a part of me grow dark. It will wither away, turn yellow then brown and then nothing. I will hold an even heavier weight than before.

Death is heavy. I can hear it.

He knew I would listen.