Contest #1

There it was again, that look of pity for the mute girl they all saw me as. It pissed me off to no end. I wasn't just mute, I was intelligent and had ideas like anyone else and I knew it, but they didn't see it and they never would.
They never looked at Susanna that way, but then again, it was easy to forget she was deaf with how well she could read lips. Winifred, she was lucky, she didn't have to see the looks people gave her in the halls, and she never saw the way they parted like the Red Sea for her whenever she walked in the halls with her cane tapping in front of her. But for me, I saw and heard everything, the only problem was I could never speak out and tell them all to quit with their pity for me, I didn’t need it.
You would think centuries of suffering would make me more tolerable to this common experience, but not even close. I would think over time people would get over themselves and see that even though I couldn’t speak to them with my voice, didn’t mean I didn’t know how to communicate. This idea led to people not talking to me ever, not when I raised my hand in class, not even when we were assigned to work with someone, every teacher would have me work alone seeing as they didn’t want a “miscommunication” to happen between students. If you ask me, that’s a load of shit.
I don’t even remember what I sounded like before the curse stole my voice from me, I’m not sure Susanna or Winifred remember either. What I do remember were the early days and nights I spent crying silently into Susanna’s shoulder filled with anger, frustration, and something else.
The silence labels me as fragile and someone to be wary of, but if only those who saw that label saw what it contained, I wonder if they would be as distant as they always are?