the silent symphony

Death heard them every time a soul was delivered.

He was the one who offered the idea in an attempt to bring some life to the place, which was ironic considering that it was the home of the dead.

Death picked a few of the deceased — famous people, like Mozart, Beethoven, and Shostakovich — and gave them instruments: percussion, strings, or woodwind.

He was the one who conducted the orchestra of the dead.

Melodies were like spun gold. Every soul was aching to hear the orchestra at least once. Especially the damned. But they never could.

Death made sure of it.

He placed the damned souls right in front of the orchestra, but removed their ability to hear, leaving them to wander in a deadly silence for the rest of eternity, only being able to gaze at the orchestra and imagine what music could be playing.

He was a cruel one — Death.

But what else could one expect?

Andrej Lišakov

I told my mom that I could hear them. Whenever I put my ear against the floor, I could hear the ghostly tunes of rotting violins and crumbling flutes. But I could hear the music as clearly as the light of day.

The Orchestra of the Dead — that is.

My favourite part was when he — the conductor— froze his baton mid-air, because that meant the duet was coming. The duet — usually violin and piano — was improvised by the souls; it was beautiful — maybe even better than the actual piece.

I told my mom, when we drove to school, “When I die, I’d love to join the orchestra.”

She always asked me, “What orchestra?” and I would tell the story all over again.

Then the doctors came.

They told me I was going insane for imagining such preposterous things — the dead creating an orchestra and the conductor being Death?

I was not insane.

I knew I wasn’t insane, so I tried to prove it.

I told them to place their ears against the floor and listen to the orchestra.

They didn’t hear it.

But I did.

I am not insane.

I tried to run away, but they caught me. My parents — my own blood — sent me away to an asylum — a place for crazy people.

But I wasn’t crazy.

I am not insane.

What were they talking about?

I broke free. I found my parents and ended the stain on our family name.

I lived the rest of my life in a cottage settled near a lake.

Life was beautiful again.

The best part? It was so quiet in my cottage that I didn’t need to press my ear against the floor to listen to the Orchestra of the Dead. I heard them loud and clear from my bed every night.

At the age of ninety-nine, I died.

I was overjoyed.

I could accomplish a dream I’d craved over nearly a century.

But I didn’t realize I would be one of them.

The people who had received front row seats to an orchestra that they could never hear. It was torture, and Death knew it.

I know because as he sorted the souls, he grinned at me — a grin filled with malice and cruel beauty.

Ever since I was damned, I watched the orchestra — going as close as I could — and stood forever, attempting to listen to something I knew I never could.

How funny, Death thought that night as he conducted the Orchestra of the Dead.

She doesn’t realize her own insanity.