Noise. Noise was much. I clapped my hands a few times for it to stop. It didn’t stop. No, his anger was boiling over, angry words spilling out of his mouth, making far too much noise. Noise, when he called me, 'naive' and 'stupid.' Noise, when he fractured my family. My angry daughter left me because I was still with him. Never to return. I had shut my ears and my eyes to block the noise, I heard him yell, "nothing is possible with you around, you're a bloody disaster.” Row over a kitchen bowl he’d wished to put the dates in because I hadn’t agreed. Noise. Because he couldn't or wouldn't take criticism of any sort.
Repairing this fracture was a task I took seriously. Rubbing ointment all over them and more—‘rub em’ up the right way,’ Mum often said. I did just that. To and fro between him and my daughter, applying balm on bruises and bruising of all sorts mental, and physical—rubbed ointment gently, generously which they desired and more. Until my fingers numbed, my body ached while their demands rose.
Then one day, my train got derailed when I was coming home. Thrown out of the window, I landed here on platform for the paramedics to balm me up this time around. I got better and back on my feet to do some more mending of a family of hard-knocks; wasn’t easy. Creatures of comfort, they just never got better; my daughter left. Hit badly, my spirit broke, enough was enough. But I kept my cool.
One night in bed, I heard the front door click open. Too tired to get out, I fell asleep. When I woke up the noise was gone. Silence. Suddenly silence was everywhere. I came out and realised that he'd tidied up my little room before he left. Peace prevailed. One, two, and three days passed in complete silence. That door never opened again. He never walked in. Mad! Was he actually gone? All sorted, then. But this neat little room he'd tidied up for me was nothing more than vast silence and emptiness.
DoubleSpeak 