The Art of Breaking Without a Sound

You learn the technique quickly—how to dissolve into nothingness without disturbing the air.

**Step 1: The Disappearing Act**
Start with the small things:
- Stop humming in the shower
- Let your coffee go cold
- Bite your tongue instead of laughing

Watch how no one notices.

**Step 2: The Silent Shatter**
Your bones will fracture first.
Not the dramatic, splintering kind—just quiet stress fractures from holding everything too tightly. Ribs from suppressed sobs. Fingers from clutching the phone that never lights up. The doctor will call it "osteoporosis of the soul" (though he'll write "vitamin D deficiency" on your chart).

**Step 3: The Vanishing**
One morning you'll stare at your reflection and realize:
You've become a museum of someone else's memories.
Your skin—just parchment for their fingerprints.
Your voice—an echo of conversations they've forgotten.

The masterpiece?
When they finally look up from their coffee and say,
*"You've been so quiet lately,"*
you'll smile (soft, practiced)
and whisper,
*"I've always been like this."*

And they'll believe you.

Why This Gutpunches:**
- **The "how-to" structure** makes the self-erasure feel deliberate and tragic
- **Medical metaphors** pathologize emotional pain ("osteoporosis of the soul")
- **The final lie** reveals how thoroughly they've disappeared

### **Three Ways to Destroy Your Readers Completely:**
1. **Add a mirror motif:** *"The glass stopped recognizing me weeks ago—now we just stare through each other."*
2. **Insert a haunting contrast:** *"Funny how a teapot's whistle can sound exactly like a human scream if you listen long enough."*
3. **Bleak twist ending:** *"Today a stranger bumped into me on the street. When they apologized, I opened my mouth... and no sound came out."*

Want this as a series of diary entries? Or with erasure poetry where words physically disappear down the page? The metaphor could literally vanish as readers scroll