Breaking The Silence

The slow sound of Christian music filled up Braelyn’s ears as she patiently stood on the spot, reading the lyrics to the song in her head as the voices around her sang in tune with the piano. As usual, Braelyn found herself standing at the very last row of the benches. Out of all the things Braelyn had expected doing in church from praying to listening to the priest, she would have never of guess singing.

Braelyn quickly sat back down when the song had ended. She looked around the room, remembering a lot of the faces she had seen yesterday. Most of the kids that were at the drawing table yesterday were all sitting a few rows further up. To her left, was the Jonas kid she had run into every church event ever since she had gotten here.

She couldn’t comprehend why he had to be there every time she was. Braelyn didn’t find him annoying or anything, but she had always gotten the feeling he had wanted her to speak to him every time he had tried to talk to her.

Today, the Jonas kid was sitting with his family. Although, the room was quite noisy now, Braelyn could still hear them clearly, since they were sitting on the opposite bench to her.

“… That chick you were talking to at youth group – how did that go?” Joe asked. “Did you get her number or something?”

“No,” Nick answered.

“Did you get her name at least?” Kevin asked this time.

“I think I heard her name was Braelyn,” Nick replied. Braelyn found herself surprised that they were talking about her like she wasn’t there. She was just besides them, but they didn’t see her there at all.

“Do you know anything else about her?”

“Well, I tried talking to her yesterday,” Nick explained. “She was at the same drawing table Frankie was. She didn’t really talk to me. When I asked her a question she kind of wrote me a note with her answer on it.”

“Kind of?” Joe quoted, confused.

“I mean, she did,” Nick corrected. “She did write me a note. But after that, she walked off like she was mad at me or something.”

Braelyn felt a sudden wave of guilt rush through her body. She had given him the wrong impression that she was mad at him, when she wasn’t.

“Maybe she was annoyed because Frankie kept on talking to her, and that just bugged her,” Joe suggested, slightly doubtful.

“You know that drawing I showed you yesterday?” Nick continued.

His two older brothers nodded, indicating a ‘yes’.

Suddenly the feel of guilt died down, and instead a rush of anger took over her body when Nick had said he showed her drawing to them. It was meant to be private – her little hope! All she wanted to do was to get up from her seat and punch him in the face for doing that, but she stopped herself. That wasn’t who she was at all.

“… Well that was the drawing she left,” he finished.

“So you mean she hasn’t spoken to you at all… Not one bit?” Joe said.

“I’m trying to tell you that I think she’s you know…” Nick attempted to hint without being blunt, but his brothers did not perceive their younger brother’s unhelpful hint.

“Deaf?” Kevin guessed.

“Afraid to speak?” Joe said.

Nick glared at his older brothers, then found himself slightly surprised at how close Joe’s guess was. “You idiots! I think she’s, well you know…” he hesitated then looked around the room for a moment like people were spying on him, and lowered his voice and spoke. “A mute.”

Although Nick had lowered his voice, Braelyn could still hear him, but only by just. She had realized he had worked out what was wrong with her, after he had only spoken to him three times, and each time, she had walked off.

“Now we’ll pray for a moment to our Lord,” the priest up the front said behind the podium. “Let’s thank the Lord for what we have and more!”

Braelyn watched Reverend Jackson lower his head, and placed his hands together. Suddenly, everyone in the room followed suit, and soon, Braelyn realized what she was suppose to do.

She joined in with the rest and slowly lowered her head and stuck her hands together, letting her thoughts take over what she wanted to say in her prayer. She had so many things she would wish for. She didn’t care about using the right words. Finally, Braelyn took in a deep breath and began.

I have so much to tell you, God…