Chapter 5: The Hollow Silence
Chapter 5: The Hollow Silence
---
The Walk Home
The walk home is a blur.
Each step feels heavier than the last. My legs move on instinct, not intention.
The streets of my neighborhood—usually quiet, familiar—feel... off. Distant. Like I'm walking through a place I recognize but don't belong to anymore.
The houses lining the street look the same. Normal. Untouched.
But me?
I don't feel the same.
Sounds that should be comforting—the bark of a dog, a passing car, muffled laughter from inside a house—feel like they belong in a world I don't have access to anymore.
I keep walking.
Not because I want to.
But because stopping means thinking.
And right now, the last place I want to be is inside my own head.
I round a corner. My house comes into view.
Small. Unassuming. A far cry from the kinds of homes I've seen before—especially the kind Serena would be used to.
That thought stings.
It shouldn't. But it does.
She feels distant now. Like a dream I barely remember.
I stand there, staring at the front door, feeling like an outsider in my own home.
I don't want to go in.
But I do anyway.
---
A Home That Offers No Solace
The door clicks shut behind me.
Silence.
Too much of it.
Normally, I like the quiet. It's comfortable. A break from the noise of the world.
But tonight?
It feels... heavy.
Like the walls are closing in.
Like the whole house is watching me.
Everything is exactly the same as it was this morning.
The living room? Neat. The kitchen? Spotless. The faint scent of coffee still lingers from when my parents left.
Nothing has changed.
But I have.
I drop my bag at the door. It lands with a soft thud that feels too loud.
I move through the house like a stranger. My body remembers the path, but my mind isn't here.
The walls, the furniture, the pictures hanging in the hallway—they all feel like ghosts of a life I'm not part of anymore.
Every object is a silent witness.
To what happened.
To what I didn't do.
I make it to my room. The only place in the world that's truly mine.
It doesn't feel like it.
---
The Crushing Weight of Memory
I collapse onto my bed.
The mattress gives beneath me, but it doesn't help.
Nothing does.
I stare at the ceiling. Blank. White. Empty.
And my mind?
It won't shut up.
The day replays in my head, every scene hitting harder than the last.
The whispers.
The laughter.
The shoves—not meant to hurt, just meant to remind me of my place.
And Jason's voice. Always Jason's voice.
"You could just disappear, and no one would even notice."
I shut my eyes. Hard.
But the words don't leave.
They settle.
Deep.
I tell myself it doesn't matter.
That their opinions don't define me.
That one day, I'll prove them wrong.
But right now?
Those words feel empty.
Because there's a voice inside me—quieter, but crueler—whispering…
"What if they're right?"
"What if, no matter how much I try, I'll always just be Derrick Steins—the invisible nobody?"
My fingers curl into fists.
The weight pressing down on my chest feels unbearable, like my own ribs are trying to crush me from the inside.
I open my eyes. The ceiling stares back.
It doesn't have answers.
---
The Prison of Solitude
Being alone has never bothered me before.
I used to like it.
Prefer it.
No expectations. No pressure. No exhausting need to be someone I'm not.
But tonight?
Tonight, solitude feels like a cage.
There's no one to talk to.
No one who would get it.
Not my parents. They wouldn't understand.
Not Mason. He's my only real friend, but even he doesn't live in my world.
And Serena?
That warm, fleeting moment we had earlier? It's already slipping away.
Like a dream I'm waking up from too fast.
I take a slow, shaky breath.
This feeling.
This suffocating powerlessness.
I can't live like this.
I won't.
But right now—
I don't know how to change it.