ACT I.
ACT I: THE DISAPPEARING
“They told me silence is the space between words. They lied.
Silence is the material they use to build your wall.”
Noar stepped into the hallway. He stopped.
His shoes on the linoleum didn’t make a sound. His shadow took one more step. It stopped a full second later.
Noar had been silent for so long that even his shadow had forgotten him. He was an echo that had lost its source.
Silence wasn’t emptiness. It was a brick. Every day a new one. Placed exactly between him and the rest of the world. Cold. Smooth. Airtight. Silence had weight. It had the temperature of December ice. It pressed against his lungs like heavy white dust that cannot be coughed out.
Chalk does not scream here. It became ash before it touched the board.
The classroom walls breathed. Slowly contracting and expanding in the rhythm of Noar’s fear. The neons above the board buzzed. Trapped rage in glass. They knew him better than he wanted.
Noar walked to the mirror by the lockers. He raised his hand slowly. He wanted to touch his cheek. The reflection hesitated. It came to the glass only after a long, cold moment.
When did you stop trusting your own face?
This is the Act of Disappearing. No scream. No flash. Noar crumbled like chalk under too much pressure from a stranger’s hand. White powder covered the tips of his shoes. He wanted to tell the truth. He wanted to shout no. Instead he swallowed the still air. It tasted of notebooks and rust.
The world adjusted quickly. In the cafeteria the blue pattern of the tablecloth was already visible through Noar’s palm. He was an empty seat that no one missed. He had become part of the order that erased him.
Then he saw the crack. Thin as a silver hair. It cut the dark in two. Until it appeared, Noar didn’t know his wall was fragile. Until he heard the voice from the depth of that fissure, he didn’t know he still had one. A rumble deep in the earth.
The dark was waiting for him. Not a trap. A mirror trembling with fear. It was afraid Noar would arrive too late. That he’d evaporate before he could embrace his own shadow.
Fear is not a scream. It is a layer of dust on the place where you once forgot to breathe.
