Without Words Ellen O | 39-connell Vk

The months passed. They built a world out of gestures. A tilted head meant are you hungry? A tap on the wrist meant look at the sunset. A hand over the heart meant I’m here.

She put her hand in his. That was the first conversation.

She hadn’t spoken in four days.

By Ellen O’Connell (inspired tone)

She didn’t bolt.

He did.

The cabin sat at the edge of nothing. No town for thirty miles, no road for ten, no path for the last three. Nora had walked that non-path in the dark, her boots caked with mud, her hands bleeding from pushing through pine branches. without words ellen o 39-connell vk

The third week, a storm came. The kind that howls down the mountain and tries to tear the roof off. Nora woke screaming. Not from the wind — from a dream. A man’s hand. A locked room. A silence that wasn’t peaceful but prison.

His name was Silas. He was a trapper, a hermit by choice, a man whose own voice had grown rusty from disuse. When he opened the door at dawn, rifle in hand, he saw a woman with dark hair plastered to her skull, shivering in a torn coat, holding up a letter. The months passed

One night, deep in winter, he carved her a small wooden bird. A sparrow. He set it on her pillow. She found it and held it to her chest. Then she walked to him, took his face in her hands, and kissed his forehead.

He shook his head.