Shattering Whisper

My sister was crying.

She was trying to hide it, but I could see her shoulders heaving up and down, her entire body racked by sobs. I stared out the window, and complete darkness stared back. Little lights zoomed by, I guess from fireflies. Brooke’s sobs became louder and louder, and I saw my parents glance at each other. I would have rubbed her back in comfort, but for some reason I was afraid, as if she would bite me. Brooke never cries, but ever since Keith, our brother, got cancer three months before, she’d been a mess.

We pulled onto a dirt road, our car shaking violently. I gripped onto the leather seats. We’d been driving on these empty, dark backroads for a very large portion of our ride. My head banged against the window, and my knee jabbed into the book I’ve been reading. All of a sudden, I got a sudden urge to sob. I felt like I had to explode. We’d been driving since eight o’ clock A.M., when my parents woke up Brooke and I and shoved us and our suitcases into the car. We crossed so many state borders, and the last one I saw was Indiana. But that was several hours before. At that moment, I had no idea where we were.

I was too afraid to ask, though. All four of us had been dead silent the whole entire sixteen hour drive (except for Brooke’s crying). I didn’t want to be the one to break the silence.

I saw a light out of the corner of my eye, and turned to see a bright light coming from a lonely looking gas station. One car sat in it’s parking lot. Still, this gave me a sense of security. It felt like years since I saw any signs of civilization. But once it was out of sight, I sunk back into my scared and anticipating mood.

We pulled onto another dirt road, then another, and each one became more rocky and much more dark. For ten minutes, we drove down this one road, nothing on either side of it. Just trees.

“We’re here.” My father said in a whisper, but it still seemed to shatter the air. He turned to the left. I quickly turned my head.

A house. A tiny, white shack covered in moss. No houses on either side of it. No town anywhere around here. No people or even signs of life for miles. What were we doing here?

Again, complete silence. I looked over at Brooke, who stopped crying just to stare with her mouth open at the place. I did, too. My mother had on the same expression, but quickly wiped it off her face. 

My father, not caring to look at any of us, shut off the car and stepped outside. My ears rang from the sudden silence. I just shook my head and opened the door, slamming it behind me. 

“Where are we?” I said in a bratty tone.

My father looked at his shoes. “Pennsylvania.”

“Why are we here?” I raised my voice.

“Because... your mother and I decided it was time for us to leave California. We needed a change.”

By now, I was so angry, I could barely stand straight. “You... you needed a change? What about Brooke? What about me?”

“We didn’t want to upset you...” He said sheepishly.

So many thoughts were running through my head. “It’s the middle of the school year.”

“We enrolled you and Brooke in a school near here.”

“A school near here?! How far away is that?”

“About thirty minutes.”

And then, it hit me. The most important thing in my thoughts right now, hanging on the tip of my tongue. It took me a moment to say it. But when I did, it came out as soft as the glow of the fireflies. 

“What about Keith?” Tears filled my eyes.

My father was silent. No sighs, no shifting. He stood there. Once I swallowed back my tears, I looked up at him to find that he was faced the opposite direction. This just made me angry.

“I said, what about-”

“I heard you!” He yelled. His voice was filled with so many emotions, I couldn’t identify them. I staggered back. I saw that a single tear was rolling down his cheek. He turned and rested his hand on the only section of the house that wasn’t moss covered.

My mother came out of the car as soon as he yelled. “Ready to go in?” She said in a fake, overly cheery voice, as she opened the door for Brooke. I can tell that my mother explained everything to her by the look on her face- the same angry expression I was feeling. My mother shuffled us towards the front door, a gray, rotten slab of wood. The doorknob was rattling and rusty. My father pulled keys from his pocket and he fumbled with the lock.

When did he get those? I wondered to myself. How could I not have seen it?

The front door creaked open and I heard a soft whimper from Brooke. I felt the same way, but I kept it in. Brooke was only ten, it was harder for her than it was for a fourteen year old.

We all stepped inside, as my father turned on the lights. I saw exactly what I knew I would see. To our rights were cream colored, brown stained couches, surrounding a wooden table that had many cracks going through it. The kitchen was to the left, with a rusty refrigerator and one telephone connected to the wall. The color of the walls were white, but you could barely see it under all of the dirt. A fly buzzed at the yellow lightbulb in the middle of the ceiling.

See, our house at home was worth thousands and thousands. It was a beautiful, three floor, mansion-like new house that everyone at school wish they had. Everything was spotless, in place, and completely comfortable and cheery. That home had beautiful windows all over to make it bright - but this place had only one window, right above the sink.

The four of us stood motionless, but the floor still creaked beneath our weight. The refrigerator automatically started humming. A cricket chirped from somewhere in the house. 

My father put his hands on his hips and smiled. “Well, welcome home!”

Brooke let out a loud cry. My mother bent down to comfort her.  My father started to bring in the suitcases as I stood looking around in awe. 

In that very moment, as I looked around at the unbearably ugly new “home” I was standing in, I realized we weren’t leaving for a long time. I knew by the painful looks between my mother and father. Those looks. 

The looks that said, “Why us?"

And, as I looked down at Brooke, she didn’t look like herself anymore.

She looked like a porcelain doll, cracked on the floor.

She looked helpless.

I was helpless.