Dead Silence

Dead Silence
Written By: P.B. Tedrow


Drip drop.
The water dripped… the water fell… driiip drop… The water dropped in the absolute absence of atoms. The rough voice began to speed in a shriek, “Drip-drop-drip-drop!”. As the water fell, the seconds flew off the clock. The soldier, sitting in the dark was being forced to listen to drops of water, a leak, rain; the water fell and continued to do so for what felt like infinity. Was it infinity.
Drip drop.
“Drip drop.” The ominous seconds in between drops broke the thought of sleeping as if it were twigs broken by fellow enemies of the country.
Drip drop.
“Drip drop.” The two words the soldier knew by heart, the only two true words that held any meaning to-
Drip drop.
Him. Concentration became something of the past. Instead it being the automatic gesture of the sub-conscious mind; it was an art of the past. The soldier’s concentration was depleted. Sometimes in the absence of the world and humanity the soldier was granted a break from the water. The drips and the drops took a bit longer as if time had stopped or maybe that the rain had stopped.
Drip drop.
And when they did take their time following through what had been the vacancy of the open air, moments of silence is not what brought cheer to the soldier. What brought cheer to the soldier was the sound of the notes of what he thought was soothing, the harmonica. Where the stranger knew he had the harmonica, the darkness of the empty space made it impossible to even think about finding anything.
Drip drop.
The soldier made very little noise looked for the harmonica, gliding his hand among the rough muddy dirt. The soldier hands glided for a few seconds before a double drip drop fell.
Drip drop, drip drop.
Suddenly the sound of rummaging stopped. Was the soldier separated from reality by his service? What was the point? What could he do? The drops just kept on falling.
Drip drop.
The sound and rhythm of the harmonica came back to the soldier who tried to make music flow throughout his body.
Drip drop.
In the heart of the darkness, the soldier believed he could see it bouncing around, only to slam him in the face much like the torture of the harmonica. The noise, the echo in the drums of his ears annoyed the soldier in the absence of drip drops. The fewer drops, the more time the stranger thought; the more, the faster the insane clock of his went.
Drip drop.
Faster.
Drip drop.
And faster.
Drip drop.
The soldier could not run because he could not see; he could not see but only hear. Then the thought passed through his mind if he could hear, he could find the harmonica and if…
Drip drop.
All of a sudden the silence of the jungle came to mind. The thoughts of silence were silent but broken up by him playing his harmonica on the boat into the horrors among horrors. The harmonica that haunted the jungle now haunted him. The harmonica that had cradled his fear now cradled his mind. It haunted the soldier.
Drip drop.
The sharp shriek of the harmonica cradled him to sleep with the fear of the noise “getting” to him, never knowing whether he would ever see any of the world again.
Drip drop.
At every drip and every drop, the odds, by his own standard, dropped.
Drip drop.
An epiphany rose over the vast land known of the human mind as if it were the sun shadowing over the chaotic Cambodia. The drip drops (while they dripped the echo of the sound) did not reach the soldier as his fingers grazed the dirt. The fingers scrambled as if they were the natives of the Vietnam fleeing in to the jungle. This second fed the fire of energy of the soldier who worked faster and faster for the harmonica. An object nicked and glided in the darkness of the drip drops. The soldier scurried in the dark.
Drip drop.
The wooden structure in the dark met the hand of the soldier. The harmonica made of wood, made of his own creation, his own hands. Creation.
Drip drop.
The soldier began to pound into the dirt by the wall. The pounding and beating of the harmonica of shrieks into hell to gain access to heaven cut his hand at every pound into the ground.
Drip drop.
The dirt began to spread. Light shattered through.
Drip drop.
The red dirt spread. Light ran through.
Drip drop.
The soldier heard shrieks of the harmonica drape down from the sky as does the clear vision of humanity.
Drip drop.
The soldier scraped through the hole and then…
Silence, sapient silence.
For once there was five seconds of nothing but silence. No drips, no drops; the world was normal again. For in that time life was given a justice but as hard fought as the soldier fought for the silence, the silence became void, dead. While the drops of the water were no longer there, the cries of war mingled with the fear of the crude shrieks of the harmonica. The soldier quickly mauled through the brush into the jungle. While the triumphant escape soothed the soldier, enemy fire went in and out of his wrist. The sudden sound of the shrieking harmonica made the soldier clamp the harmonica, trying to drown it of it’s sound. The soldier tripped on a fallen soldier as bullets grazed the jungle. A wooden spike impaled the ankle and it exploded like the Big Bang. The soldier stuck, bound to the spike, could not hear enemy fire, only the shrieking of the harmonica which splintered his palm. Another bullet grazed the inside of his left wrist causing the harmonica to fly into the silence of the jungle. The soldier watched… and watched… the harmonica fly as the evil consumed the corpse while it drained in the jungle.
Silence, sapient silence as the sun sets.
The harmonica which lay in the jungle was suddenly picked up a soldier. “Lt. James Coppola,” the soldier said aloud to the jungle while taking a drag from his cigar, “recently deceased.”
Drip drop.