Silence Read Online Free

the man looked like, and they’d track him down. They’d make sure he left me alone. Then they’d talk me back through the night, retracing my steps, and somehow the gaps in my memory would stitch back together and I’d have something to work with. I’d shake off this detached version of myself, this feeling of being suspended in a world that was mine but rejecting me.
    I stopped running only to hoist myself over the cemetery fence. There was a field one block up, just on the other side of Wentworth Bridge. I’d cross it and weave my way up the tree streets—Elm and Maple and Oak—cutting through alleys and side yards until I was safe inside Vee’s house.
    I was hurrying toward the bridge when the sharp sound of a siren wailed around the corner, and a pair of headlights pinned me in place. A blue Kojak light was attached to the roof of the sedan, which screeched to a halt on the far side of the bridge.
    My first instinct was to run forward and point the police officer in the direction of the cemetery, describing the man who’d grabbed me, but as my thoughts came around, I was filled with dread.
    Maybe he wasn’t a police officer. Maybe he was trying to look like one. Anyone could get their hands on a Kojak light. Where was his squad car? From where I stood, squinting through his windshield, he didn’t appear to be in uniform.
    All these thoughts tumbled through me in a hurry.
    I stood at the foot of the sloping bridge, gripping the stone wall for support. I was sure the maybe-officer had seen me, but I moved into the shadows of the trees bowing over the river’s edge anyway. From my peripheral vision, the black water of the Wentworth River glinted. As kids, Vee and I had crouched under this very bridge, catching crawdads from the riverbank by inserting sticks speared with hotdog pieces into the water. The crawdads had fastened their claws to the hotdog, refusing to let go even when we lifted them out of the river and shook them loose in a bucket.
    The river was deep at the center. It was also well hidden, snaking through undeveloped property where no one had forked out money to install streetlights. At the end of the field, the water rushed on toward the industrial district, past retired factories, and out to sea.
    I briefly wondered if I had it in me to jump off the bridge. I was terrified of heights and the sensation of falling, but I knew how to swim. I only had to make it into the water …
    A car door shut, yanking me back to the street. The man in the maybe-police car had stepped out. He was all mob: curly dark hair, and dressed formally in a black shirt, black tie, black slacks.
    Something about him slapped my memory. But before I could truly grasp it, my memory slammed shut and I was as lost as ever.
    An assortment of twigs and branches littered the ground. Ibent down, and when I straightened, I was holding a stick half as thick as my arm.
    The maybe-officer pretended not to see my weapon, but I knew he had. He pinned a police badge to his shirt, then raised his hands level with his shoulders.
I’m not going to hurt you,
the gesture said.
    I didn’t believe him.
    He sauntered a few steps forward, taking care not to make any sudden movements. “Nora. It’s me.” I flinched when he spoke my name. I’d never heard his voice before, and that made my heart pound hard enough that I felt it clear up around my ears. “Are you hurt?”
    I continued to watch him with growing anxiety, my mind darting in multiple directions. The badge could easily be fake. I’d already decided the Kojak light was. But if he wasn’t police, who was he?
    “I called your mom,” he said, climbing the gradual slope of the bridge. “She’s going to meet us at the hospital.”
    I didn’t drop the stick. My shoulders rose and fell with every breath; I could feel air panting between my teeth. Another bead of sweat slicked beneath my clothes.
    “Everything’s going to be okay,” he said. “It’s all over. I’m not going to