February 7
Dear Athan,
I don't know if this will reach you. I don't even know if you still live at home or if they send these to the fireplace like before. But I'm writing anyway. They said I can now. They gave me three sheets and a pencil that's been chewed at the end like a bone. I don't mind. It's the nicest thing I've been given in a while.
It's cold here. I've grown taller, I think. My trousers are shorter than they were and the wind gets in easy. Sometimes I dream of soup. Mama used to make one with little things floating in it like clouds. Maybe you don't remember.
I heard someone call my name in the dark last week. It was probably just a dream. Or the boys playing again. They like to say things they know I'll hear. I don't listen most days.
Do you still read? I always imagined you did. I think about that time—do you remember?—we poked our fingers through the wall. You touched mine. That was a long time ago, wasn't it?
They say I'm better now. That I've calmed down. I didn't know I was loud to begin with. I think the silence did something. Not bad, just... different. I talk more inside now.
I hope you're well. I hope you still like red. I found a piece of ribbon in my coat pocket. I think it came from the old nursery. It smells like dust but I keep it anyway.
I don't know what else to say. It's strange to write again.
I missed this. I missed you.
Lou
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Silence
There are hours when I forget what my voice sounds like. It grew quieter in here after they took away my paper, my letters, my pencil stubs. I still wrote you, Athan. In my head. In the grain of the wooden wall. On the back of my hand when no one was looking.
Sometimes, I used to whisper to myself so I wouldn't forget the shape of words. I gave things names—my blanket was "Hollow," the flickering ceiling lamp became "Watcher." I wrote a play once where I was two people talking. One was me. The other was who they thought I was.
I don't think it made me worse. I think it made me clearer. Still lonely, though. Still floating.
Sometimes I pressed my ear to the wall and imagined your voice. It's strange how memory warps sound. I think you spoke softer in my dreams than you did in life.
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February 13
Dear Athan,
There's a boy here. He's older than me. I think he's sixteen or seventeen. He has grey eyes like the sky when it wants to snow. His coat is too big and he smokes when the groundskeeper's not looking. He gave me part of his biscuit yesterday. Just handed it to me. No reason. Didn't even look long.
His name is Dallas. I don't think he knows mine. But he didn't make fun of me. And he didn't throw the biscuit after. He just left it in my hand.
I didn't eat it right away. I saved it. It was stale but it felt important.
I watched him tap his fingers on the table today like he was playing a piano. I've never heard a real piano. I think he knows music.
I wonder what else he knows. He walks different. He doesn't flinch when someone raises their voice. That's how I can tell he's not like the others.
Love,
Lou
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The noises are back. At night, under the floors. A deep dragging sound, like furniture being moved across concrete. I asked one of the boys about it. He said, "That's the old one waking up."
I laughed. He didn't.
We dared each other to sneak into the cellar hall. It leads to the kitchens, but there's a door no one opens. The knob's rusted. Someone scratched words into the wood, but they're too worn to read.
I stayed behind. The others went in. They said the air smelled wrong, like blood and rot and stone. One boy came back pale, wouldn't talk for hours. I pretended I wasn't scared, but I didn't sleep that night.
I keep dreaming about water under the school. Cold, black water. And something moving in it.
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February 21
Dear Athan,
I've been dreaming more. One dream keeps coming back. I'm in the dining hall, only it's flooded. I'm waist-deep and I can't find the doors. There are candles floating and something touches my ankle but I can't see what.
Mama is there too, but she doesn't have a mouth. She watches me and I try to talk but nothing comes out.
I woke up crying. I think I said your name. I don't know why. Maybe I thought you could help. Maybe just hearing you might stop the cold.
Dallas says dreams can mean things. He says they're just the body trying to remember something.
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Dallas caught me tracing the lines of music into my notebook. He didn't laugh. He nodded and said, "You're writing it wrong. But you'll get better."
He brought me a splintered piece of piano key. Said it came from a broken instrument in the old hall. Said I could hold it when I wanted to remember the sound.
I kept it under my pillow. When I touched it, I heard low notes in my head, like shadows humming.
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March 1
Dear Athan,
I know you probably won't read this. Maybe you forgot me. Maybe that makes it easier. I just wanted to say something out loud again.
I feel strange inside. Like I'm a room people forgot how to open. I think of home and sometimes I wonder if it was ever real.
Do you ever feel like you're not supposed to be real?
I want to be. Even if it hurts.
I want—
(The letter ends abruptly. The paper is wrinkled and slightly damp at the edge.)
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A boy in my dormitory fell ill. His mattress was soaked through—water, they said, but it smelled sharp, like old iron. The headmaster came storming in. He held up the notebook Dallas gave me and asked where I got it. Said it was found under the boy's bed, pages torn out.
I said nothing. Dallas stood up and said he'd given it to me. They didn't believe him.
That night, I found my pillowcase slashed open, feathers all over the floor. The boys laughed. One whispered, "Next time, it'll be your skin."
A teacher caught me with another letter. Ripped it from my hands, read it out loud. My words twisted in his mouth, like dirty water poured over clean.
They forbade me to write again.
I was fourteen by the time they let me pick up a pencil.
And by then, so many words had gone quiet.
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March 10
Dear Athan,
I made up a game today. You'd like it, maybe. It's a pretend kind of game, one you play in your head when it's too quiet. You pick a word—any word—and you try to live the whole day without hearing or saying it. I chose "home" today. It was harder than I thought. I kept thinking it, and that counts. I lost.
The game made me sad after a while. But I played again. I picked "name" this time. That one was easier. No one says mine anymore.
Dallas saw me playing with the feather again. He asked if I wanted to learn a song. I nodded too fast.
He said the song's old. Real old. He found it in a drawer in the storage room when he was helping fix the hinges. "Said to be cursed," he told me, grinning, but not like he believed it. He hummed it for me.
It sounded like rain hitting glass. Slow, then fast.
I've been humming it ever since.
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The snow didn't melt, not even when March came. The courtyard froze over. One of the boys slipped and cracked a tooth. He blamed me, said I looked at him strange. The teachers believed him.
I stopped going outside when the bells rang. Dallas said they can't punish you for staying still, only for moving too loud.
That's when I started writing in the space under the stairs. No one ever looked there. I used bits of charcoal I found near the boiler. My fingertips stayed black for weeks.
I wrote about Athan. I wrote about a version of him that never turned his back. A twin who would've fought back for me. A twin who might've read every letter. Might've written back.
I wrote about Mama. I told her about the rats in the cellar and how they sounded like whispers. I told her I missed her hair, even if I only remember it through keyholes.
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March 20
Mama,
The boys tied a string around my ankle while I slept. When I stood up, I tripped and fell hard. They laughed. Said I walk like a ghost.
One of them—Timothy, I think—took my notebook. Drew awful things in it. Things I don't want to write about. He said if I told anyone, he'd tell them I did it. That's what they do here. They make you look like the bad one.
I miss your perfume. Even if it wasn't for me. I used to smell it in the hallway and pretend you were nearby.
I try not to cry too much anymore. I pretend my tears are for songs. Like Dallas says.
Please tell me I'm not bad. I still don't know what I did.
I love you. I miss you.
Lou
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One night, I followed Dallas to the old music room. He had found a way in through a broken door hinge. Inside was a cracked upright piano, half the keys chipped. But it made sound. That was enough.
He taught me middle C. Then a minor chord. My hands shook so bad, the notes sounded like shouts. But Dallas didn't laugh.
We stayed there for hours. The dust turned our lungs black. The cold bit at our knuckles. But I didn't care. That room was mine. Ours.
That night, I dreamed again of the flood. Only this time, the water wasn't dark. It was red.
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March 27
Dear Athan,
I remembered something today. A game we played. You tapped on the wall and I had to guess the rhythm. I got it wrong most times, but once—I think once—I got it right. You laughed.
I hear things in the music room now. When I play alone, the piano echoes strange. Not like how Dallas sounds. Sometimes it hums long after I stop.
I think the building is listening.
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The teachers found the piano.
I don't know how.
They didn't yell. They just locked the room and took the key. I found Dallas in the courtyard after, smoking again.
"They're scared," he said. "You made them scared."
I didn't understand.
He handed me a page. Not music. A letter. Folded neat. Addressed to me in handwriting I didn't know.
Inside was a single line:
"Some melodies aren't meant to be remembered."
Dallas didn't explain. I didn't ask.
I burned the note that night, but I still hear it. The melody. The humming.
It doesn't leave.
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April 1,
Dear Athan,
I still play the piano. I wait until everyone is asleep and slip inside the music room. But it's different now. Every time I play a note, the walls seem to lean in, like they're listening. It's like I'm trapped in a dream I can't wake up from.
Dallas doesn't come anymore. He stopped after that day, when the teachers found us. He acts like nothing happened. I don't think he likes me anymore. He doesn't even look at me.
I don't know if I can stay here much longer. I'm getting better at playing the piano, but every time I make a mistake, it's like the air goes still, like it's waiting for something terrible to happen.
I've been having bad dreams. The house is always full of fog. There are doors that lead nowhere. And I keep hearing voices behind them, soft whispers calling my name. But when I open the door, there's nothing there, just the same old hallway.
The teachers watch me now. They don't look at me the same. They don't even care about the music anymore. Only the silence.
I'm scared. I don't know why. Maybe it's just because I'm alone.
Love,
- Lou
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It's been weeks since that night. Since Dallas stopped looking at me. But I still go to the piano, every night, though I'm not sure why. It's like something inside me is pulling me back, like I'm tethered to the notes, even if they make the air heavy and thick.
Tonight, I dared to touch the broken strings. They were frayed and sharp like glass. The sound it made wasn't music at all. It felt like it was cutting through me.
But I didn't stop. I can't stop. There's something in the sound, something it's telling me.
I heard a knock at the door as I played. I stopped playing. No one came in. No one ever comes in.
I looked at the door. I swear I saw a shadow. Thin and pale. I don't know if it was my imagination, but it felt too real.
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April 5
Dear Athan,
I heard something in the hallway again. I know it was real this time. I went outside to see if I could find anyone, but the hallways were silent, like the rest of the school was asleep.
I wanted to believe it was just my mind playing tricks on me, but I don't think it was. There's something wrong here. I've heard the rumors.
The boys keep saying things about the basement. About things locked down there. It's not a joke anymore. I hear them whispering. It's worse than before. Every time they talk about it, I hear the same phrase:
"The house always takes back what it gave."
I don't know what they mean. I don't know if I care to know.
I asked the teachers about the basement once. I don't think they heard me. They just looked at me like I wasn't even there.
I don't know how to explain it, but I feel like something is happening, something bigger than the school, bigger than me. I can feel it in my chest, like a slow pull. It's been like this for days.
I think I'm losing my mind. But I'm not sure if it was ever really mine to lose.
Love,
- Lou
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The Empty Hall
I remember the day the teacher came to me after class. She was always cold, always so distant. Her name was Miss Sutton. Her glasses reflected the lamplight as she asked me to stay behind.
I didn't want to stay. But I did. She didn't seem angry, just tired. Tired in the way people get when they've seen too much.
"Lou," she said, like it was a question, "you've been keeping to yourself lately."
I didn't know what to say. She waited, her pen tapping against her desk. Then, she slid a sheet of paper across the table. It was blank. No words. No instructions.
"Tell me," she said softly, "tell me what's happening."
I didn't know how to answer. I only knew the music in my head. The melodies that echoed in every quiet corner of the school.
"The others," she continued, "they're not like you. Don't try to make them. You're special, Lou. But they'll never understand that."
I stared at her, trying to make sense of what she was saying. Her words didn't match her eyes. Her eyes were full of fear.
She left me with that paper. It sat in front of me for hours, its emptiness swallowing me. I didn't write anything.
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April 12,
Dear Athan,
I don't write this because I think you'll reply. I don't even know if you still want to hear from me. I write it because it's the only thing left to do.
I hear the others talk about the things they've seen, things they've done. They think I'm too quiet to listen. They think I don't understand. But I do. They talk about things in the dark. They say they hear things moving in the walls. They don't think it's important.
The things they hear—it's not just rats. It's not just the wind.
I don't know what's real anymore. I don't know if I ever did.
Dallas is gone. He hasn't spoken to me since that day in the courtyard. I can still hear his voice sometimes, late at night, under the hum of the school lights.
I don't know where he's gone.
And I don't know what I'll do when the whispers come again.
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The Silence That Hangs
It's the quietest it's ever been.
Tonight, there's nothing but the soft scrape of the wind against the glass. The moonlight is too pale, too far away to matter.
I don't know what happens after this. I don't know what the house is waiting for, or what I'm supposed to do next.
I can't escape. No matter how hard I try, no matter how fast I run, it feels like the walls close in tighter.
But I won't stop writing. Maybe someone, somewhere, will understand.