The Sound
written by: Amira Waleed
My thighs flex as we hear the sound coming from outside. You move your head from my lap and walk to the window. If I were alone, I would think the walls were collapsing, but now that you are here, you keep them steady with your hand leaning on one of them.
We started hearing this sound three months ago. At first, some people in the neighborhood mentioned hearing things they couldn’t recognize at night, but soon enough, they forgot about it. A week later, it became more hearable. There was no animal, object, or anything that people could use to explain how it sounded. A sporadic piercing sound that would terrify the fearless and wake up the dead. Sometimes it would come ear-splittingly, and we would have nothing to do but cover our ears or hold each other like babies until it would stop. No one in the city knew where it came from. And no one else in the rest of the world had known anything about it for the past two months, the neighboring villages would only complain about the screams they heard by people suffering from it, not the sound itself.
Very few people decided to leave it all and move out of the “cursed” city. And for the rest, we had got accustomed to the sound after the first 40 days. However, that was not the end of it. Thick smoke clouds began to appear in the sky by the 50th day. They would get thicker and darker every day and the sun has become afraid to shine through them.
Eventually, the sound followed those who left the city. It was a country-wide disaster with ambiguous roots. Now the sound is followed by strong earthquakes and sometimes torrential rain. People had to stay in fallout shelters “in case things got out of control.” That was the mayor’s statement as if he had it in hand then. For the sake of safety, the idea was supported. For the sake of us, the pictures that our walls embraced were too precious to let the sound, pouring rains, or whatever it is that is happening swallow. It took us a couple of extra days of danger to collect everything, just in case life offered us a second chance.
On the last day at home, you draw the curtains and return to sit in front of me, holding my hands and getting closer. I see all the blue of the universe in your eyes. But as you shut them, the moonlight gets so bright that it hurts mine. I can see the whole world now. I slightly move my face towards your ear and whisper: “You are not real.”
Your eyes, having opened widely, turn fully black, and a sudden scream comes out, even more explosive than the external sound. It felt like I could die or faint or lose my hearing to your unstoppable voice. At this point, I’m not sure if you, or any human being, could make that sound until I was blocked out from everything around me.
After God knows how long, I manage to open my eyes, the room gradually comes into focus while I’m catching my breath. I’m not surprised you are gone; I knew you were not here. You are just a dream I would sleep forever to have again, to see you again, to feel you again.
- Birthday Call - September 28, 2024
- The Sound - June 4, 2024
- Anonymous - February 8, 2024
