The Voice (Original Short Story)

 

Memories. Rows and rows upon rows of them, happy, sad, angry, conflicted and those that feel so embarrassing that you can’t seem to forget them. You cringe just as hard as you did every single time you remember them. Then there are the ones that seem so unremarkably dull or boring that you can’t help feeling blasé about them. You feel they are not momentous at all and you’d rather trade them for anything else. How else, you wonder, can you fit any more memories in that tiny little mind of yours?

So many memories crammed into that brain and yet I can’t seem to replace her. I don’t know where did Cotton-eyed Joe come from or where did he go but neither do I know where did she come from or where did she go. All we had was one fleeting moment where nothing really happened and yet everything happened. Despite it having had no particular dominant emotion, I still remember that day just as clearly as if it was yesterday. 

My two sisters and I had convinced our parents to let us go to the city carnival fair. It was no small deal for us, them having just turned sixteen and me fourteen. With strict warnings to me to stick by their side and some money in hand, we were dropped off at the entryway to the fair. My excitement knew no bounds as I kept eyeing the bright Ferris wheel but my sisters kept me in check as they visited each food stall. There was no shortage of enticing snacks all around but I just could not take my eyes away from the wheel. 

My opportunity came a few minutes later, when both my sisters were preoccupied with selecting an ice cream flavour, one wanting butterscotch and the other wanting chocolate. There was technically no issue as they could’ve each just gotten what they wanted but they were trying to get the other to also eat the same flavour. Normally, I would’ve pitched in and introduced another flavour into the discussion but the opportunity was too perfect to let go of. 

Darting quickly through the crowds, I couldn’t bear to take my eyes off of the wheel for more than a few seconds. I don’t remember how many people I pushed aside and how many couples’ interlocked hands I broke through and I don’t even remember getting on the wheel. I remember reaching the top of the wheel and, for a magical moment there, feeling like I was floating in the clouds. I couldn’t hear the screams from below and I couldn’t feel any of the panic rushing through the hordes of people watching in abject horror as the wheel swayed almost deliriously to the side. I couldn’t hear my sisters shouting my name as they looked for me everywhere. I couldn’t hear the almost human noises the wheel creaked out. The only thing I could hear was her voice.

I did not feel startled when she spoke even though I didn’t know she was there. Her voice rang out like a musical sparkle in a language that I did not understand. I could not see her but I could feel her presence as she laid a hand around my shoulder. She didn’t speak again nor did she attempt to sign anything through gestures. She just sat by my side, one hand slung around my shoulder, in utter silence. It felt calming. Never before or never after have I ever appreciated silence as much. Just me, her and the fluffy clouds around us that didn’t look any different from the cotton candy they sold down there. Down there where all the people were crying out for their loved ones and knocking over stalls, where some of them already lay dead, trampled by the stampede, where a desperate troop of policemen were trying to calm down the crowd.

I don’t remember what happened next. The next thing I knew, I was in a hospital bed. Multiple scratches ran up and down my appendages but I was unharmed for the most part. One of my sisters had an arm fracture and the other had a head injury but they were both fine too. We were back to our normal routines by the end of the week and nobody ever thought of it again. Except me, of course. Fifty-seven years of latching on to that memory later, I heard that laugh again, just a couple of seconds before I started reminiscing this story. I hear it again, now! I turn around and look for her, through the rows and rows of books surrounding me. I can’t seem to find her but I still keep looking, for how can you forget the one voice you hear in your entire life?