Silence

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Lytton, Deborah A., author.
Silence / Deborah Lytton.
pages cm
After an accident robs Stella of her hearing and her dream of going to Broadway, she meets Hayden, a boy who stutters, and comes to learn what it truly means to connect and communicate in a world filled with silence.
ISBN 978-1-60907-945-1 (hardbound : alk. paper)
[1. Communication—Fiction. 2. Love—Fiction. 3. Deaf—Fiction 4. Stuttering—Fiction.
5. Self-acceptance—Fiction. 6. People with disabilities—Fiction.] I. Title.
PZ7.L9959Si 2015
[Fic]—dc232014019063
Printed in the United States of America
R. R. Donnelley, Crawfordsville, IN
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

For my daughters, Ava and Caroline
Who inspire me with their faith, courage and grace

Music is the silence between the notes.

—Claude Debussy

ME

— 
Stella
 —

I hear the thunder of feet moving across concrete floors. Lockers clanging. Cell phones ringing. Flirtatious laughter. Hollered greetings. Books dropping. Doors slamming.

The melody of Monday morning at Richmond High School. It plays in my ears like a soundtrack to a movie about someone else’s life. I watch from the outside. Listen from the outside. Moving through the noisy hallways without making a single sound. Because I am a nobody. Invisible. Silent.

I walk down the crowded corridor, wrapped in anonymity.

My best friend, Lily, waits for me in front of my locker.

“The cast list is going up right now,” she tells me in her soft voice. A hopeful smile lights up her pretty face. She is wearing mascara. And lip gloss. I’m not sure whether I like it or whether it makes me feel like Lily is becoming someone else. Someone I don’t know. Lily tosses her head so her blonde curls dip in front of her face. She grins as two football players pass by. It looks like a move she has practiced in the mirror. Then Lily turns back to me, expectantly. “I’m sure your name will be on it.” And there is the Lily who is my best friend. The kind of friend who really believes in me, even when I don’t believe in myself.

“I hope so,” I answer as we turn toward the hallway that houses the drama department.

I am quiet and unheard. Most of the time. Except when I sing. Then I feel like a nightingale sharing my song. My voice reaches out to the world because in those moments, I can fly. I am suspended in the air. Like magic. When I sing, I’m no longer invisible. I’m no longer the fifteen-year-old who never raises her hand in class, who only has one friend and never volunteers to be first for anything.

When I sing, I make my own soundtrack. I believe anything is possible. Miracles can happen.

Lily is talking about some gossip involving people at school I don’t even know. I tune out. I am more nervous than I imagined I would be.

I remember the exact moment I knew I could sing. I was in first grade. My teacher asked each of us to sing a part in the school performance—alone. My teacher, Mrs. Fisher, was looking down at her notes when I opened my mouth. I felt the notes soar out of me like feathers floating on a soft summer breeze. I curved the notes, held them out, kept them in time. I made the feathers dance on the wind. I was so happy to be singing, I didn’t notice anything else at first. But then Mrs. Fisher’s eyes were on me, not on her papers. A bright smile lit up her face. Every other head in the room turned to watch me. And I got my very first solo.

All of the kids at school knew I was the girl with the voice. I was seen, I was heard, I was somebody. Maybe I still didn’t quite fit in, but I had a place. And I felt safe there. That was before my parents split up our family, before my mother moved my sister and me to new schools. Before everything changed. Nothing like starting high school without one single friend. It’s like entering a cave of lions completely unprotected. Only one thing you can do: hide.

That’s why it’s been over a year since I’ve had the courage to sing outside my bedroom. No one here knows me as the girl with the voice. They don’t know me at all.

But last Friday, I took my chance. I auditioned for the school musical because
West Side Story
happens to be my favorite musical of all time. And because Lily said she would never forgive me if I didn’t try. But mostly because I knew I would never forgive myself.

“Walk faster,” Lily urges as she grabs my hand to pull me along.

“I don’t know why I’m so excited,” she tells me. “It’s not like
I
auditioned.”

I give her a sideways grin. Lily has the worst singing voice I’ve ever heard, but she can speak French and Italian fluently, and she does math problems for fun. Still, she wants to change all that. She wants to be seen as more than a brain. I guess you could say that she just wants to be seen.

“On the outside,” I say, “you’re a sophomore, but inside . . . you’re a stage mother looking for your daughter’s big break.”

Lily giggles at my teasing. “I’m calling myself Stage Mom from now on.”

We’ve reached the drama room. The entry to the theater is marked by crimson double doors. Above them is a wooden sign:
drama
. Around the doors are posters from theater performances at Richmond from the past twenty years:
Oklahoma, My Fair Lady, Pippin, Grease, Hairspray, The Music Man, The Phantom of the Opera, Les Misérables.

The red doors are like a stop sign.

Stop. Are you talented enough to enter?

The cast list for the musical is posted on one of the doors. A crowd is gathered in front of it. I can hear emotions circling around me, polarized into two distinct sounds. Shrieks of joy. Moans of disappointment.

Lily squeezes my arm. “I’ll wait here,” she tells me as she finds a spot near the poster of
My Fair Lady.

“Be right back,” I say.

I wade into the melee. Look for my name.

A supporting role is the best a sophomore can expect. The top part of the list will be the leads. I fix my eyes on the bottom half of the list. Scan it quickly. My name isn’t there.

I wasn’t good enough. Rejection is the painful reality of every performer. I know this, but it hurts just the same. Disappointment tastes bitter in my mouth. I had placed more hope in this audition than I realized. I swallow and turn away from the list. I promise myself I will not cry. Not here. Not now.

I try to make my way back to Lily. I will have to tell her. I will have to say the words aloud. She will probably be able to tell from one look at my face.

The crowd presses in on me. Roaring in my ears. I can’t break free. I am pushed back toward the door as I try to move away from it. Everyone clamors to see if their name is listed. Tears burn my throat. I will not let them release.

I will try again next year, I promise myself. The promise wants to make me feel better. It doesn’t. I want to go home, but I can’t break free from the crowd.

Then I hear it—my name. “Stella Layne? As Maria?”

I turn to look in their direction.

“Who is Stella Layne?”

“I have no idea.”

“Isn’t she a
sophomore
?”

The words whirl around me like leaves in a hurricane. I can’t grasp them.

Suddenly, I turn around again. The list is directly in front of me. That’s when I see it.

My name
is
there.

Not in the supporting cast list.

But as the lead.

As Maria.

The lead in the school musical.

Me.

Stella Layne.

I can’t believe something so wonderful is happening to me. I don’t deserve it. I must be dreaming. The tears that threatened seconds earlier dry up as though they have been heated by the sun. I feel warm all over. Golden.

Joy fills my heart so full I can’t contain it, like a bright light seeping through the cracks of a closed door. I can’t stop smiling.

This is the best day of my life.

LIFE

— 
Stella
 —

The next day, I can’t wait to go to school. I walk to class, chatting with Lily. I obsess about my geometry test. Lily obsesses about boys. Boys equal trouble. Look at my mom and my dad. He’s on to wife number two, family number two. We’ve been left behind. An every third Saturday commitment, like a golf game.

Better to focus on schoolwork. And singing. Always on singing. My dream keeps me going. Broadway. Someday I will sing on a Broadway stage. I can imagine the orchestra playing. The bright spotlight. The hush of the crowd as they wait to hear my voice.

I can communicate through music—feelings, emotions. Things I can’t share in any other way. People feel them when I sing. And somehow, in those moments, I feel connected to the world around me, to the people around me. Imagine being able to do that every day. Forever.