Chapter Text
The sound of trash slamming against the grand outer walls of the city crashes through the night like a shattered symphony. Metal shrieks. Glass splinters. Something heavy drags before it’s swallowed by another impact. The whole world outside feels like it’s being torn apart.
I stand in the living room with my forehead pressed to the cold windowpane, letting the vibrations travel through my skin. The glass trembles faintly beneath me. It’s stronger than usual tonight.
The last time the trash storm was this violent, I was barely more than a toddler. I remember screaming until my throat burned, overwhelmed by the sudden noise. For someone like me, when the world explodes without warning, it’s terrifying. Sound isn’t just sound, it’s everything.
It didn’t help that my parents were panicking too.
Though, if I’m being fair… they were only twenty-three. Twenty-three, with a blind firstborn daughter. I used to hear the neighbors whisper about it when they thought I couldn’t hear.
Such a burden.
Such a shame.
I never blamed my parents. It can’t be easy.
The storm doesn’t scare me anymore.
I’m a big girl now.
Daddy once told me that if you listen carefully enough, even chaos has rhythm. “There’s melody in everything,” he said. So tonight, I decided to test that.
I slid the window open just a crack. The air smells like rust and dust and something sour from the trash that the Sphere keeps throwing down here. The noise sharpens instantly—layers upon layers of collision. I tilt my head, isolating patterns. Heavy drops. Sharp skids. Hollow clangs.
Then I swayed.
Slowly at first.
I hum beneath my breath, matching the tempo of falling debris, stitching harmony into destruction. The walls shake, but in my mind, it becomes percussion. The shriek of metal bends into violin strings. The wind through the cracks becomes a low chorus.
For a moment, it’s beautiful.
Until I hear my mother’s footsteps.
They’re careful but hurried—fabric swishing, heel against wood.
“Evangeline… What are you doing up alone?” Her voice carries that familiar tightness. “It’s late. You know mommy doesn’t like you walking around by yourself.”
The music inside my head collapses.
“I’m sorry, mommy…” I whisper.
She took my hand. Her grip is gentle, but firm enough to remind me I’m not trusted to move on my own. I’ve told her so many times that I know this house by heart. I know every floorboard that creaks, every corner, every shift in air when a door is open.
But she still guides me.
It makes my chest ache in a way I don’t have words for.
When we reach my room, she lifts me onto the bed. A kiss presses against my forehead. “Goodnight, sweetheart.”
Her footsteps fade down the hall.
Five seconds later, softer ones approach.
Thalia and Theodore.
The mattress dips as they climb into my bed.
“So?” Thalia whispers, barely containing her excitement. “Did you hear any music?”
I nodded; eyes closed like always. Kids my age say my eyes look scary. Empty. Wrong. Keeping them shut doesn’t change anything for me—but it makes other people more comfortable. I don’t want my siblings to be afraid of me.
They giggle.
“You’re so brave, big sis,” Theodore murmurs, curling into my side. “When the trash falls down the Sphere, I always think it might fall on us.”
“It could,” I admit softly, reaching to find the top of his head. My fingers brushed his hair and I pat him gently. “But the wall is strong. It protects us.”
That’s what we’re told, anyway.
“Can you sing, Evangeline?” Thalia asks, her voice is already thick with sleep. “I like when you sing.”
I nod and begin again—quieter this time. I recreate the melody from the storm, softer, gentler. I smooth out the sharp edges. I turn falling wreckage into something warm.
As I sing, my mind drifts back to the window.
I want to hear the rest of it. The parts I didn’t get to finish shaping.
But I don’t want mom to worry.
Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to be a normal girl. A girl with eyes that work. I want to play with the neighbor kids without adults hovering. I want to walk outside without someone holding my wrist like I might disappear.
I want to know what colors look like.
What my parents look like.
What Thalia’s smile looks like when she laughs.
What Theodore’s eyes look like when he’s scared.
What I look like.
I snap out of my thoughts when I feel Thalia’s breathing slow, steady and deep. She’s asleep. Theodore follows soon after.
I hold them closer.
I was born blind. There is no cure. No miracle waiting for me. No hidden doctor who can fix what never worked in the first place. I was born into this nothingness, and I will die in it.
I don’t hate it.
It’s my world. It’s all I know.
I just wish my parents didn’t treat me like I’m fragile glass. I don’t need a cane inside our home. I don’t need someone to guide me every second. I can navigate by sound, by memory, by air shifts and echoes. I am not helpless.
Maybe they’re just scared because I’m still little.
Maybe when I grow up, they’ll see me differently.
The storm continues outside, pounding against the wall that separates us from everything discarded.
I listen until sleep finally pulls me under. Still, subconsciously, I’m chasing the melody hidden inside the fall.