Hearing Hope by Anna Kingston

She first heard the noise early on Monday afternoon, and only then because the rain had finally stopped thundering onto the skylight above her head. 

It was very faint and soon drowned out by the sound of the television downstairs - unbearably loud even all the way up here.

She dozed in the warmth of the sunlight as it finally filled the attic room after the gloom of weeks of dark, wintry weather.

Early next morning, before the sounds of the houses around her subdued it, she heard the noise again - alien, yet familiar at the same time.  She tried to open the skylight above the bed, but wasn’t tall enough to reach the lever - so frustrating!

As the days came and went so did the noise, but she felt it was getting closer to her room at times.  He gently chided her, saying it was her imagination or that she was hearing the television from downstairs.  She was too tired to insist that she was sure of what she could hear.

By Friday, the sound was much closer and almost identifiable, and her heart leapt when she heard it - though whether through joy or fear she didn’t know.  Impatiently, she waited for him, so that she could tell him what she could hear, and insist he listen for himself, but he didn’t come upstairs.  She fell asleep straight after lunch and when she awoke it was dark and quiet again outside.

Very early next morning, the television suddenly blasted out at full volume, startling her awake so suddenly that her heart’s pounding felt just as loud.  Beneath the sound of the television were other sounds, new yet familiar - real voices shouting, he was angry now and she felt real fear.

The banging reached a crescendo and then stopped abruptly.  Simultaneously, the din of the television was snuffed out.  The lack of noise felt suddenly deafening for a few seconds, and then the noise she’d heard all week rushed to fill the space, like water rushing into a new depression in the sand.

At that moment, the attic door quietly opened to admit two people who walked in cautiously, sharp intakes of breath the only sound in this tiny space. Warm hands gently untied the scarves and ropes that had kept her bound within the room, and led her, stumbling, from the house.

Outside for the first time in months, sounds assaulting her from every side, she finally identified the sound that had eluded her: police sirens that wailed and warbled, their voices regularly snatched away by the gusty, spring winds.  Sirens that had signalled to him that forces were closing in, but that had whispered to her that her hope had been heard and answered.