Silence by Rebekah Shimer (summer books TXT) 📕

I asked her, “Why?”

“She thought that I was indifferent about our relationship and that she was going to give you to someone else!”

Did Audrey really think that I would just leave her to go with someone that Emily told me to go with?

I asked her after a few seconds, “Well I can definitely tell that you aren’t indifferent about this relationship since you almost got into a fight at school for me. Second, I would never just leave you for another girl. I really want this relationship to work for us okay?”

She nodded and I smiled.

I said sternly, “Good. Now you better get to class. You don’t want to be late.”

“I don’t think I can help that now.”

I smiled and walked to my art class.

The rest of the morning followed with the usual drooling looks from other girls, but there was just one girl on my mind. I wondered if Audrey had kept it together during her other classes, but I didn’t have to wonder long. Before I knew it, I was meeting Audrey at the doors to the cafeteria.

I asked her jokingly, “Did you get in anymore fights?”

She glared at me and said, “You can say what you want but I still think I seriously would’ve fought her for saying those things.”

“Why do you care about what she thinks?”

She shrugged her shoulders and I decided that I needed to drop the subject. Whenever Audrey didn’t want to talk about something anymore, she shut down and it was very hard to get her back to being open about even small talk.

I asked her when I realized that all of the tables were full, “Where are we going to sit?”

She scanned the tables, but her eyes rested on one table in particular. I looked over and saw Logan sitting with Bruce and Emily. Bruce was actually a kind of cool guy that I got along with, but Emily was something else. It seemed as if she thought it was fun to mess with other girl’s minds. We walked over and sat down with a few people that we knew from our other classes. We didn’t really talk much, but the other people almost didn’t even notice us sit down. Well, they noticed me, but then they saw Audrey. I hated when people did that. They just judged Audrey without even really knowing her.

I shook my head and asked Audrey, “What are you going to do tonight?”

She said slowly, “I need to go see Delilah’s parents tonight. I’ve needed to since it happened.”

I nodded slowly and made up some excuse for her to go alone, “I’ll have some other things to do tonight anyway that I need to get done.”

She nodded and I knew she didn’t want to go over to Mark and Lindy’s house. She never really was one to be able to easily talk with people dealing with grief. I would’ve offered to go with her, but we both knew that she had to go alone, which was why I lied about having something to do in the first place. We finished lunch in silence, but I tried to hold her back from going to her next class in the hallway.

I said to her quietly, “You know that you’re doing the right thing by going over to their house don’t you?”

She nodded and I smiled at her. I left her and walked to my next class, which was science. I had Bruce as a lab partner, so that made the class more tolerable in my opinion. I walked in and nodded at Bruce as I sat down.

My teacher started, “Okay class today we’re going to go over Macrominerals and how they affect the growth of leaves.”

I immediately started to zone out and draw on my notebook. Bruce passed me a piece of paper and I slowly unfolded it.

It read, “Hey. I’m sorry about what happened with Audrey and Emily. I don’t know what’s gotten into Emily lately. She just seems different.”

I wrote down, “It’s okay. I think everyone’s a little unstable, what with Delilah and all.”

He saw what I had written and nodded his head. He stuffed the piece of paper in his book, which I took as a sign that we were done talking. I continued to draw on my notebook, not really knowing what I was planning on drawing until I saw the final picture. It was a picture of a clear sky, with only a puff of cloud to block out the shining sun. There was a long road that led off into the distance, but I didn’t know where it led. I ended up drawing a few small tufts of grass on the roadside before the bell finally rang.

I walked out of class and took a deep breath through my nose. This day had turned out more exhausting than I had imagined it would’ve. I slowly walked to my next class, which was shop class, and didn’t really bother to participate with what the teacher was showing us. I knew that I would have to go running sometime if I wanted to keep my sanity. It seemed as if two week’s worth of things to do was all packed into one. I made it through my shop class, only having to give slight nods when the teacher looked in my direction.

I walked out of school when the final bell rang and breathed in a deep breath of fresh air. It was definitely a day for running. There was hardly any wind and it was the perfect temperature, making it so I wouldn’t get too hot or too cold while running. I got in my car and slowly drove home. Another reason for running was that it would’ve meant less time at home. I pulled into the broken driveway and sauntered up to the house that had peeling paint and cracked windows. My house looked like it had been abandoned ten years ago, which wasn’t really far from the truth. My parents spent most of their time at the bar and I was mostly gone from the house doing other things so I wouldn’t have to spend time there.

I opened the squeaky door and walked into my house. I set my bags down by the door and walked into the seldom-used kitchen. I opened the fridge, but, like always, there wasn’t any good food in it. I walked up the stairs to my room and changed into my running clothes, which consisted of gym shorts and a cutoff. I grabbed my iPod off of my dresser and went down the stairs. I opened the door and shielded my eyes from the bright sun. I looked around myself and grabbed a pair of Wayfarer sunglasses that were always in my bag. I smiled as I put the neon blue glasses over my eyes and stepped out onto the road.

I started to jog down the road, not really knowing where I was going to end up. I jogged for about ten blocks before I started to walk. I wasn’t really winded; I just wanted to make my jog amount to more time than it normally would. My parent’s weren’t going to be home anytime soon anyways. I started to look around and saw that I was near Bruce’s house, which was also near Tom Adler’s house. Tom Adler used to be in jail for selling drugs to minors. He had been set out on parole recently, which had all of the families on the street worried. As I looked down at Tom’s house, I noticed that there were a lot of police cars at his house. There was a crowd that was starting to form, so I joined them. The police had broken into Tom’s house and was now taking him towards one of the police cars.

I asked a woman who was standing next to me, “What happened?”

The woman replied, “Did you know Delilah? The girl that was murdered?”

I nodded my head, already knowing what she was going to say, “Well they think that they found out who did it. They think that Tom Adler killed her.”

I sprinted the entire way to Audrey’s house. I knew that she needed to know that they had found the person that had killed her best friend. I made it to her house in record time and reminded myself that I would need to do that more often to get in shape for track. I shook my head at myself as I walked up to her front door. I knocked on the door and waited patiently as I heard someone coming to answer it. Audrey’s mom answered the door and smiled when she saw that it was me.

She noticed how sweaty I was and asked, “Did you just go running?”

I nodded, still trying to catch my breath.

I said through breaths, “Is Audrey . . . here?”

She shook her head and said, “No. She went over to Mark and Lindy’s house today right after school. Do you want to stay here and wait for her?”

I nodded and she motioned for me to follow her into the house. I regretted not going back to my house to change and I could tell that Audrey’s mom saw my hesitation to sit on the couch.

She said, “It’s okay Edwyn. You can sit down.”

I shook my head and said, “Its okay.”

I sat down on the floor and turned the TV on. I turned the news on and I immediately see that the story of Tom being found as the killer was already on the news. There was a video of Tom being put into the police car with a reporter talking on the side.

The reporter said in a slight accent, “What you’re seeing behind me is Tom Adler, a former convict, being taken into custody. Police reports state that DNA of Delilah Locke was found in Adler’s backyard and house. There is no comment at this time from Tom Adler, but he is believe to have a court case the following Monday.”

The news station switched to another station, but I just zoned out and waited for Audrey to come home.

Audrey

As the last bell for school rang, I walked out to my car slowly. I was dreading going over to Mark and Lindy’s house, but only because I didn’t really know what to do. What can you do when your best friend dies? How do you confront their parents about it? I shook my head and got in my car. I turned it on and drove over to Mark and Lindy’s house. I slowly walked up to their front door and rang their doorbell. It was a few seconds before the door slowly opened. It was Lindy. She saw that it was only me and swung the door fully open.

She said while motioning for me to follow her, “Come in Audrey. Come in.”

I smiled and her and said, “Thanks.”

We stood in the foyer awkwardly before she said, “It’s very nice for you to come here after everything. I know Delilah would’ve loved it.”

I smiled at her and said, “Yeah. I meant to come earlier but-“

She shook her head and interrupted me, “It’s fine. Don’t stress yourself.”

I smiled at her and she said, “Well. Shall we go?”

I knew that