Silence

From silence as danger to building my world through silence

The violence in silence

As the night grows calm before bedtime, I gently toss my puppy into his wooden basket.

He lets out a slight whimper.

Like a tornado from nowhere, my father storms toward a metal chair.

I don’t stop to look at what he is about to do. I run as fast as I can — with nobody to protect me. No witnesses.

The chair flies across the room, clipping my foot as I stumble upstairs towards safety.

And I don’t remember much after that. I never do.

This is a typical school night. One minute, he’s helping me with my homework. The next minute, my homework is thrown on the floor because I’m struggling to understand a math concept.

He tells me, fuck you. I learn to say it back — not realizing the gravity of what I’m saying. Then I get hit again for mimicking him. I’m silenced.

When I ask about my biological mom, whom I have never met, he boils over and screams at me to shut the fuck up.

Some days, he takes me to Disneyland. Some days, he beats my knuckles with chopsticks until my fingers swell red.

I never know which version of my dad will show up. But this time, it’s the last one I’ll ever get.

The suppression in silence

Even when he is dying, when his eyes have gone yellow, he has no words. And neither do I — I’m a speechless ten-year-old orphan who has lost everything I’ve ever known.

Silence follows me, but this time, it mutates. I move in with a family I’ve barely known from my local church. I trust them to be good Samaritans.

I’m barely asleep when hands that aren’t mine wake me up — a feeling I have no words for, only that it’s wrong.

My mind screams, but my limbs won’t move as I lie there. My eyes are sealed shut. My heart is pounding. I pretend to stay asleep. I don’t want to get in trouble for being awake so late on a school night.

As the footsteps fade in the background, I open my eyes and discover the devil of the man I have never felt comfortable around.

I’m lost and confused. I don’t understand what I feel, but my body does. I feel repulsed. Every nerve is on fire, trying to expel the truth out of me. And when I finally do, my soon-to-be-adopted mother merely grants permission to lock my door at night for what is just my soon-to-be-adopted father “fixing my pajamas.”

But in the end, it is I who is locked out of this family — kicked out without notice and transported to another city of strangers. No questions, only assumptions and judgements. I’m being silenced in the silence.

The void in silence

I’ve been floating in the void for as long as I can remember. It’s a space during, between, and after silences — where nobody can find me, but my deepest fears do.

Beyond the void, I see families laughing with each other — a closeness I don’t understand and feel I never will. And there’s nothing I can do about it — I’m not their blood.

I squint, but I might as well be blind. I reach out my hand, but I feel nothing but air.

I wait. I yearn. I move. Yet I am stuck.

I wait and wait for somebody to reach out into the void. But it’s silent. I feel what that means.

When someone says they love me, they don’t really mean it. They’ll throw me away, again.

Those words echo for miles. It’s the only sound that feels familiar to me.

The needs in silence

“Can anyone just ask if I’m okay?” I shriek.

In the exhaustion of waiting, I create my own voice.

“You’ve gone through a lot over the years. I’m here, just checking in. Are you okay?”

“I need a hug. I just wanna be held and not feel alone.”

“Well, of course, I’ll hold you until you fall asleep. You’ll wake up and see that I’ll always be here.”

I circle through conversations with myself. I’m all I have.

“Just close your eyes and believe me when I tell you I’ve got you. Fall back.”

I stumble, not quite trusting myself. But in this vastness, there is nothing to lose, and so I fall.

The comfort in silence

Thump.

I sink into what feels like pillowy, wrinkled skin. The folds of skin embrace my delicate arms.

I stretch out my hand into the air, and the hand stretches just like me.

I lift my finger, and so does the gigantic hand’s finger that mirrors mine.

And with that, I close my fist. I softly squeeze my body to let myself know that I’m there, cuddling in blankets of skin.

I rest. My eyelashes flutter as I soften a smile. I dream.

I’ve found comfort in the silence, for now.

But the void finds me still.

Building my world in silence

When he goes quiet, the doubts seep into my veins. Where are you? Do I mean anything? Am I just here until someone better comes along?

I close my eyes. I take a breath. I look beneath me.

I see and feel everything I’ve built when I am alone. I feel who I am, even if for a second, the silence reminds me I am nothing.

Once after a layoff, I built my design portfolio at 2 AM — vector by vector, meme by meme. Some interviewers didn’t laugh at my jokes. Dead silence. But I’m proud of myself for taking risks.

Once on a Friday night, I hit up friend after friend, and nobody was free. I felt like I didn’t belong again, but I sat with that feeling instead of flying out of New York City like I used to.

Once, after a breakup, I mustered the courage to watch horror movies alone instead of waiting to watch them with someone.

All the times I cried by myself in public while eating my favorite pho noodle soup near the front door of my local Vietnamese restaurant, I was the family I never had but wished for.

In the uncomfortable, painful silences, I’m more than enough — I’m more than I was before. I am my own comfort.

And I’m my own dream come alive in the flesh.

Showing up as myself — just being — has always been the ground beneath me.

(Thank you to Savannah James for this artwork in the Substack cover image! Inspired me to write this essay)