The Silence

11

POV: LOUIS

I wake up because I hear screams coming from outside my door. My mom is probably arguing with my father again.

I stretch on the bed and rub my eyes. I look at the clock next to my bed. 6 am. I still have a lot of time, so I will calmly prepare to go to work.

I hear quiet sobs and immediately turn my head towards my little sisters' bed, Phoebe and Daisy. I share a room with all my sisters because our house is too small for everyone to have a separate room.

I walk quietly towards the girls, so that our parents won't hear that I've already got up.

"Lou... I'm scared..." Phoebe whispers to me in her weak voice. I glance at Daisy and see that she is also nodding to her sister's words.

I look towards the rest of my sisters' beds. Little Fizzy sleeps cuddled up to her stuffed elephant, and Lottie listens to music on her headphones. I didn't notice that she had already gotten up too.

Charlotte was always able to be unnoticeable, which I sometimes envied her because when I was getting beat up by our father, she could always quietly sneak into our room.

However, despite this, I would never change places with her. I agreed with her that when my father would be in a bad mood again, she would take our sisters to our room while I "talk" to him.

I would do anything to make sure my little sisters are safe.

I feel small hands press on my shoulder and I look back at the twins. I wrap my arms around them tightly.

"Everything will be fine, girls. I'll take care of it soon."

I throw a stuffed animal at Lottie to get her attention.

She has an angry look on her face, but when she sees me and the girls, she takes off her headphones to listen to what I have to say.

"Give them marshmallows so the koala can talk to the bear."

My sister just nods and takes out earplugs from the drawer.

Me and Lottie already have a code. We don't want the little ones to be even more afraid, so we try to cover up what we're really talking about as much as possible.

Phoebe once saw Fizzy sleeping with white earplugs and asked why her sister had marshmallows in her ears. I told her it was because she wanted to have sweet dreams. That's why we call earplugs marshmallows. We want to make the twins' childhood as enjoyable as possible even though it's really hard.

When our father once hit Daisy in her head, the little girl came running to me crying. I hugged her tightly and stroked her brown hair. She told me with a smile on her face that I was like a koala. Since then, in my and Lottie's code, I have been a koala.

And the bear... Well, you can guess who it is.

"Come on girls." Lottie calls the twins quietly to her side.

When the girls went to their older sister, I get up and go to the door to our room.

With my hand on the doorknob, I take a few deep breaths.