We hit a bump and my brain rattled in my skull. It was never smooth riding on the potholed road leading out of my village, but at least I could usually avoid them on the two agile wheels of my bicycle. The only small comfort here was the seatbelt securely strapped from right shoulder to left hip, from left hip to right hip. The driver had done it for me, slipping metal into metal with a satisfying click.
I pressed my forehead against the window and watched the last few homes of my village slip away, my breath fogging up the glass until even the countryside disappeared in a haze of white. I sank back into my seat and closed my eyes, letting the jostling of the road rock me to sleep.
I woke up to a kind of quiet I had never heard before. There was nighttime quiet, but that was filled with the relentless buzzing of bugs in the summer, the crackling of the wood stove in the winter, and the constant snores and shufflings of my family all year round. There was church quiet, but that lasted for only seconds at a time before it was interrupted by someone’s cough or the organist beginning a new song.