Chapter 13 – Where the Silence Lives
Never Stopped Smiling
David had never noticed how empty a hallway could sound.
That morning, Amelia didn't wait for him at their usual bench by the school gates. She didn't wave from the drama room doorway, didn't toss him that lazy, half-real smile she gave everyone else. She didn't even look his way when he sat down beside her in English class.
If yesterday had been a pause in their rhythm, today was silence.
She wasn't angry. That would've been easier to face. Anger is loud. Obvious. Something you can respond to.
This was different. This was absence.
Ms. Parker was handing out scene pairings in drama when David noticed Amelia's seat was empty. Just her bag, propped against the leg like it was holding the place for someone who wasn't coming back.
Ms. Parker didn't comment. Just set the list on the podium. "Check the board for your scene partners. Performances begin next week."
The room buzzed. Whispers, groans, people scrambling to see who they were stuck with.
David didn't move. His eyes were still on Amelia's empty chair.
He didn't know why it bothered him this much. She'd been quiet before. Withdrawn. But never invisible. Not like this.
"David," Ms. Parker said, tapping the clipboard, "You're paired with Amelia."
He nodded slowly. "She's not here."
"She'll be back."
"How do you know?"
Ms. Parker stared at him for a long second, like she was reading a line from a play only she understood. "Because she always comes back."
David didn't believe her. But he wanted to.
Later, in the cafeteria, he caught sight of Amelia sitting at the far end, by the windows where no one usually sat. Her food was untouched. She was reading something—her own notebook maybe, or that tattered red diary she always carried but never opened around others.
He didn't walk over.
Not because he didn't want to.
But because the distance between them suddenly felt too wide for words.
Instead, he asked Chloe.
She was one of the few people Amelia actually spoke to during rehearsals—softly, briefly, and always with that restrained warmth like she didn't want to let anyone in too far.
"Hey, uh… do you know if Amelia's okay?" he asked.
Chloe raised an eyebrow. "You're the one she actually talks to."
"She hasn't. Not since yesterday."
Chloe closed her lunchbox. "She's going through something, I think. You know how she is—keeps everything under wraps. But I've seen her looking dizzy lately. Like, spaced-out. And pale."
"Is she sick?"
Chloe hesitated. "She didn't say. But when I asked, she said, 'It's not contagious, just inconvenient.' Whatever that means."
David felt that sentence settle in his gut like cold water.
Not contagious.
Just inconvenient.
That night, he couldn't sleep.
His mind kept circling the memory of her in the nurse's office. The slight wobble in her stance. The way she froze mid-monologue like the words were suddenly made of glass.
He opened his laptop and googled symptoms.
Fatigue. Dizziness. Difficulty breathing.
There were thousands of possibilities. None of them told him what he needed to know.
He shut the laptop. Stared at the ceiling. Listened to the silence in his room and wondered if it was the same kind of silence she was living in.
The next morning, she was back.
Early.
She was already seated on the edge of the stage when David walked into the auditorium. Her script was in her lap, hands folded neatly above it. She was staring into space, unmoving.
"Hey," he said.
She didn't look up. "Hey."
"You okay?"
A pause. "I will be."
He sat beside her, careful not to touch.
"You didn't answer my texts."
"I didn't have the right words."
"You always have the right words."
She looked over at him then. And for a moment, something in her eyes flickered—hope, or guilt, or maybe both.
"Not lately," she whispered.
They ran their lines quietly during rehearsal. Ms. Parker watched them from the back of the auditorium, arms folded, saying nothing. Occasionally, she scribbled something in her notebook, her brows furrowed like she was grading a performance none of them knew they were giving.
At one point, Amelia stumbled over a line and muttered, "Sorry."
David stopped her. "Don't apologize."
She laughed softly. "I always do."
"Don't."
Their eyes met.
And suddenly, he felt the words pushing against his throat—the memory of her pale in the nurse's office, Chloe's vague warnings, the way Amelia's light seemed dimmer by the day.
But he didn't ask. Not yet.
He was scared that asking would make it real.
After rehearsal, they packed up in silence. As she picked up her bag, a notebook slipped out. It hit the floor spine-first and opened somewhere in the middle. David bent down to pick it up—but froze.
There was handwriting on the exposed page. Small, neat. Meant to be private.
He read only one line before she snatched it from his hands.
"It's not yours," she said. Her voice was sharp—more edge than he'd ever heard in it.
"I wasn't trying to—"
"You were. You looked."
"I just… I'm worried about you."
"You're nosy."
"I care."
She clutched the notebook to her chest like it was armor. "Then do it from a distance."
That stung more than he expected.
She walked away without looking back.
And this time, David didn't follow.