Chapter four: The sound that found her
1166 Words
Not all wounds bleed. Some hum beneath the skin, waiting for a voice to break them open.
She didn’t mean for anyone to hear her.
It was just a hum, a barely there sound slipping out of her mouth as she stared out the library window, trying to stitch a lyric together. The kind of hum you make when your soul is louder than your voice.
But in the hush of the reading room, it spilled out like a whisper with wings.
And someone heard it.
“Was that you?” a voice asked from behind.
Peculiar jumped, eyes wide. She turned to see Dami from Literature class loud, always laughing, always surrounded by people who walked like they owned the campus.
“What?”
“The melody. I thought it was music playing in here.”
Peculiar's throat tightened. “No… it was just…”
Just what? A mistake? A moment she thought was hers?
“You sing?” Dami asked, stepping closer.
Peculiar shook her head. “No. I mean… not really.”
“Well, whatever you did sounded good. You should come for the open mic next Friday. The performing arts club is hosting it.”
“No, I can’t”
“Think about it,” Dami said, already walking away. “Some voices are meant to be heard.”
Peculiar sat there, notebook open, but the words on the page looked foreign now. Her hands felt too big. Her chest, too full. It was like someone had peeked into a door she’d locked years ago and left it wide open.
And now… the silence inside her wasn’t quiet anymore.
It was screaming.
She met Noah in the garden later that evening. Their bench was still warm from the sun. He looked up from his sketchpad the moment she appeared, but today she didn’t smile.
He noticed.
“What happened?” he asked.
She sat down, knees pulled to her chest. “Someone heard me humming today.”
His face softened. “And?”
“She asked me to join the open mic next week.”
“Do you want to?”
“I don’t know,” she said, too quickly.
Then, quieter:
“I’m scared.”
Noah nodded, not filling the space with anything useless. Just being there. Like a place she could rest in.
“Do you remember the first time someone told you not to dream out loud?” he asked.
She blinked at him. Her lips parted, but no sound came.
“I do,” he continued. “I was eight. I told my dad I wanted to draw comic books. He said, ‘You want to be poor?’”
Peculiar looked at him, eyes filling.
“I stopped drawing for three years after that,” Noah said. “But the stories never stopped speaking in my head. They just started shouting.”
She swallowed. “I haven’t sung in front of anyone since I was thirteen.”
“What happened?”
She didn’t answer right away. Then, slowly:
“My mom heard me singing in my room one day. She knocked once and said, ‘Keep it down. This isn’t America.’ Then she shut the door. I never sang out loud again.”
Her voice broke on the last word. She blinked fast, but the tears didn’t care.
Noah reached out, placed his hand gently over hers. His warmth wasn’t loud. It didn’t try to fix anything. It just stayed.
That night, when she got home, the lights were off in the living room — except for the dull blue glow of the TV. Her mother sat on the couch, arms folded, eyes locked on the screen, but not really watching.
Peculiar walked past quietly, heart in her throat.
But when she entered her room, she froze.
Her notebook wasn’t where she left it.
It was lying open on the desk. Pages turned. Her lyrics were exposed. The ones she wrote after Noah gave her the sketch the most honest thing she had ever put into words.
She touched the pages. They were warm.
Her heart dropped.
Her mother had read them.
She stepped back like the words had burned her. Her throat tightened. She turned and walked back to the living room.
Her mother didn’t flinch.
“You went through my things,” Peculiar said, her voice quiet, cracked.
“You left it open,” her mother replied, still not looking at her.
“I didn’t mean for you to see that.”
“It’s just childish poetry. I’ve seen worse.”
Peculiar’s mouth parted, but no sound came. She felt like a glass bottle tipped too far moments from shattering.
“I thought we agreed,” her mother said softly, still emotionless. “Music is a distraction.”
Peculiar stood there, broken wide open.
That wasn’t a conversation. That was a verdict.
“But it’s not,” she whispered. “It’s the only thing that’s ever made me feel like I exist.”
Her mother finally turned. Her eyes were tired. Not cruel. Just… hardened.
“You think music will feed you? Heal you? Give you a future?”
Peculiar’s voice rose, trembling. “It already feeds me. It’s the only thing that’s kept me alive.”
Silence.
Then: “I’m not having this conversation.”
“I wasn’t asking you to.”
Her mother blinked, surprised by her tone. But Peculiar didn’t back down.
“I’m tired of being quiet just to keep you comfortable,” she said, voice shaking. “I’m not trying to disappoint you. But I can’t keep folding myself to fit into the silence you live in.”
The words cracked something between them. Something deep.
Her mother didn’t reply. She just turned away again.
And that silence said everything.
Peculiar didn’t sleep that night.
She lay in bed, eyes wide, chest aching like someone had stepped on her heart. She held Noah’s reminder stone in one hand, and her notebook in the other.
She flipped to the last page.
Blank. Waiting.
She didn’t know if she would ever be ready. But she was tired of hiding.
The next morning, she found a flyer slipped under her door.
Open Mic Night: Friday, 7PM.
A sticky note attached said:
“Your voice deserves a room.
—N”
Her fingers trembled. She stared at it for what felt like hours.
At school, Noah was waiting by the library. He didn’t speak. Just looked at her.
“I don’t think I can do it,” she whispered.
“You don’t have to. But I believe you can.”
She stared at the flyer again.
The stage terrified her. The crowd. The eyes.
But the idea of never singing… of never trying… terrified her more.
That evening, Peculiar wrote her name on the signup sheet.
Her hand shook the whole time. But she wrote it.
And this time, when the fear showed up…
She didn’t run, she said to herself I’ve got this .
- Writer
