The Silent Prayer

Eli’s Little World

By the end of the week, the tiredness had settled into Eli’s face like a shadow that refused to leave.

It wasn’t just the nights anymore.

It showed up in the mornings—in the way he stared at his cereal without really seeing it, in the way he flinched at sudden noises, in the way his shoulders slumped under the weight of a school bag that wasn’t even that heavy.

Maya watched him as he sat at the table, his spoon slowly circling the same patch of milk.

“Eli,” she said gently, “you’re going to be late if you don’t start eating.”

He blinked, as if waking from somewhere far away.

“Sorry,” he mumbled, taking a small bite.

“Bad dream again?”

He hesitated, then gave the smallest nod.

“Same hallway,” he said quietly. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

Maya swallowed her questions.

Some days, she wanted to shake the whole story out of him.

Other days, like this one, she knew pushing would only wrap the fear tighter around his chest.

“Okay,” she said softly. “No pressure. Just remember I’m here.”

He nodded without looking up.

On the walk to school, he stayed unusually close to her side. Other children ran ahead in pairs and groups, their laughter trailing behind them. Eli didn’t join them. He watched the ground instead, his hand tightening around Maya’s whenever someone brushed too near.

At the school gate, a group of mums were already chatting—about homework, after-school clubs, and holidays. Their voices blurred into a single stream of noise Maya didn’t feel equipped to step into.

She crouched down to Eli’s height.

“Deep breath,” she said, inhaling with him. “In… and out…”

He copied her, a faint smile touching his lips for a second.

“You’ve got this,” she whispered. “I’ll be right here at the end of the day.”

He nodded and moved toward the line of children forming by the classroom door.

Halfway there, he paused and glanced back.

Maya lifted her hand in a small wave.

He gave one back—weak, but real—then disappeared into the building.

As she turned to walk away, a voice called her name.

“Maya?”

She turned. It was Eli’s teacher—Miss Allen—approaching with a gentle smile and tired eyes, the kind that had looked after many children over many years.

“Do you have a minute?” Miss Allen asked.

Maya’s stomach tightened. “Is everything okay?”

“Nothing urgent,” the teacher said quickly. “I just wanted to check in. Is Eli alright at home?”

Maya forced a small smile. “He’s… been having trouble sleeping. Nightmares.”

Miss Allen nodded slowly, as if that confirmed something she’d already suspected.

“I thought it might be something like that,” she said. “He’s a bright boy. Very bright. But he’s been… quieter lately. A bit withdrawn. Sometimes he stares out the window for whole stretches of the lesson. When I ask him a question, he jumps like he’s been somewhere else.”

Heat crept up Maya’s neck. “I’m sorry. We’re working on it.”

“Oh, there’s nothing to apologise for,” Miss Allen replied kindly. “Children go through all sorts of phases. I just wanted you to know we’ve noticed he’s not himself. If there’s anything we can do to support him here, please tell us.”

Maya nodded, her throat tight.

“Thank you,” she managed.

As she walked away from the school, the teacher’s words echoed in her head.

Not himself.

Withdrawn.

Staring somewhere else.

She thought of the hallway in his dreams.

Somewhere else.

Somewhere, he kept walking toward even when he didn’t want to.

The thought chilled her.

Inside the classroom, Eli’s world felt smaller than it used to.

He sat at his desk and stared at the worksheet in front of him. The instructions are blurred. His pencil hovered above the page.

“Okay, everyone,” Miss Allen said cheerfully, “We’re going to write a short story today. Imagine a place you know very well. It can be your bedroom, your favourite park, the playground—somewhere that feels familiar. Describe it for me.”

The children began to write, pencils scratching, chairs creaking. A few whispered to their neighbours, unable to contain their ideas.

Eli’s hand remained still.

A familiar place.

His bedroom should have come to mind.

Or the living room.

Or the small park where he and Mum sometimes sat on the bench to eat chips.

But all he could see was the hallway.

Long.

Dark.

Too many doors.

No end.

His chest tightened.

He didn’t want to write about that. He didn’t want to give it any more space in his mind than it already had. But every time he tried to imagine somewhere else, his thoughts slid back there like a marble rolling to the deepest part of a bowl.

“Eli? You okay?” a voice whispered beside him.

He looked up. It was Amir, the boy who sat at the next desk. They used to trade football cards at break. Lately, Eli hadn’t brought any.

“Yeah,” Eli muttered. “Just thinking.”

“You haven’t written anything,” Amir pointed out, not unkindly.

Eli shrugged, forcing a small smile. “I will.”

He bent his head and wrote the first line:

The hallway was too long.

He stared at the words.

His hand tingled. He erased the sentence quickly, heart racing, as if writing it might make the dream more real.

Instead, he scribbled a new line.

There is a park near my house.

The description that followed was thin and vague. Trees. Grass. A slide. It was the kind of park anyone could have imagined without ever being there.

But for now, it was safer than the truth.

Across the room, Miss Allen watched him. She saw the way he stared at the page before writing. The way his shoulders hunched. The way his eyes flicked to the door whenever the corridor outside creaked.

At break time, when the other children spilled onto the playground, Eli stood near the fence, hands shoved into his pockets. The playground noise felt too loud, like it might split his skin open.

“Do you want to play?” Amir called, already running toward a group starting a football match.

“Maybe later,” Eli replied.

He didn’t join.

He watched.

He watched the swings creak.

He watched the shadows of the climbing frame stretch across the ground.

He watched the school building’s doorway like something might step through it.

Once, he thought he heard his name.

Just for a split second.

“Eli.”

He spun around, heart pounding—but it was only two girls calling to each other nearby, their voices overlapping, not meant for him at all.

Still, the tremor stayed in his hands.

After school, Maya could tell immediately how the day had gone.

He walked toward her with that same small, careful step. Not running, not excited, not bursting with stories the way he used to.

“How was it?” she asked.

“Okay,” he said automatically.

“Just okay?”

He shrugged. “We did writing.”

“What did you write about?”

He hesitated—a fraction too long.

“The park,” he said finally. “Nothing special.”

Something in his voice sounded like a door closing.

On the bus home, he rested his head against her arm and closed his eyes. A few stops in, he dozed off, his breath warm against her sleeve.

Maya watched his face.

In sleep, a faint line formed between his brows, as if even resting, he was bracing himself.

At home, while he sat at the table doing homework, she unpacked his bag. A folded worksheet slipped out of one of the folders.

She smoothed it open.

At the top, in his neat but slightly shaky handwriting, he had written: There is a park near my house.

The sentences underneath were short and flat. No colour. No joy. Nothing like the boy who used to get excited about describing even the smallest things.

On the back of the page, where the lines stopped, there were faint pencil marks. As if he had started to draw something and then erased it.

She held the paper at an angle.

Her heart stuttered.

The faint outline, half-erased, looked like… a corridor. Long. Narrow. With small rectangles along the sides that could have been doors.

A cold ripple moved through her.

“Mum? Can I have a snack?” Eli called from the table.

She quickly folded the paper and slipped it back into the folder.

“Yeah,” she said, forcing lightness into her voice. “Give me a second.”

That night, after he brushed his teeth and climbed into bed, she sat beside him for a while.

“Did anything… weird happen at school?” she asked casually.

He shrugged. “No. Just normal stuff.”

“Did you feel okay in class?”

“Yeah.”

“Play with your friends?”

“Kind of.”

“Kind of?”

He looked away. “Sometimes I just feel… funny. Like my tummy is tight. Like something is going to happen, but I don’t know what.”

“Do you feel like that now?” she asked softly.

He thought for a moment. “A little.”

She placed a hand on his chest, over his heart, and rubbed gently. “You know you can tell me anything, right?”

“I know,” he whispered.

He yawned, eyes already heavy.

“Can you stay until I fall asleep?”

“I will,” she said.

As his breathing slowed and deepened, Maya leaned back against the headboard, watching the shadows gently move on the wall. Her mind drifted to Miss Allen’s concern, the half-erased drawing, the way Eli flinched at sounds that never used to bother him.

Whatever was happening to him wasn’t just at night anymore.

It had followed him to school.

Into his little world.

She swallowed the rising panic and let out a long breath.

“God,” she prayed silently, “I don’t know what this is, but please… don’t let it take his joy. Don’t let it take his mind.”

In the stillness of the room, Eli turned slightly in his sleep, as if reaching toward her presence.

Maya rested her hand on his arm and made herself a quiet promise.

Tomorrow, she would message the teacher properly.

Not just polite replies.

A real conversation.

If this was getting bigger, she wasn’t going to face it alone.