Tears of the Broken (37 page)

Dad
just sat there—saying nothing. My mouth hung open a little; I can’t
believe he didn’t correct her. Betrayal. Again.

Infuriated, I threw my napkin down and stood up. “Mike and I
are friends. That’s all it’s ever been!”

“
Ara, sit back down. Vicki knows that,” Dad said.

“
No, Dad! I’m tired of it. Just because
Mike’s a boy and I’m a girl?” I pointed to my chest. “Don’t you
guys get it? Don’t you understand what
David
means to
me?”

“
Honey, you’ve known him for a week,” Dad reminded
me.

“
Yeah, and that was enough to make me fall in love with him,”
I retorted, “but seventeen years didn’t work for Mike? So what’s
gonna change now?” Why are they ganging up on me? This isn’t
fair.

“
She’s got a point.” Sam shrugged.

I
looked at Dad and he looked at Vicki. “Ara, you’re so young. This
thing with David—it’s just an infatuation. You can’t know what love
is yet,” she said.

“
How
can you say that?” I leaned forward slightly. “You don’t know what
I feel. None of you do—”

“
Honey, you can’t feel that kind of love at your
age—”

“
So, are you saying that I don’t love
you
, Dad?” I folded my
arms.

“
What your father means to say—”

“
How would
you
know? I’m sorry, are you the all
experienced love gurus because you’ve both had a failed marriage?”
I waved my hands around at the word
guru
, then dropped them to my hips.
“So, just because I’m under eighteen, means I don’t know how to
feel?”

“
We’re just saying that love is complicated,” Dad said and
held his hand up to Vicki, quietening her. “It takes a long time to
figure it—”

“
Don’t tell me I don’t know my own heart.” I
pointed to my chest again. “’Cause I can tell you, I do—and it
hurts,” my voice broke under the strain of tears. “It hurts all the
time, Dad. It hurts for Mum, and Harry, and Mike. And I loved them.
And I love you—” my squeaky voice shook, “so, you can’t tell me I
don’t know what love is, because I think of all the people in this
room, I’m the most highly qualified to say what
my
heart is capable of.” My eyes
flicked over everyone as I composed myself with a jagged
breath.

Dad’s jaw fell open and Vicki looked at her salad. Sam
hovered between standing and sitting, his eyes reaching for me in a
way I’ve never seen before. I feel bad for him that he’s seen me
talk to his mum and dad that way. I wish I’d just kept my mouth
shut.

My
lip broke into an irrepressible quiver; I bit it between my teeth.
What am I supposed to do now? Run away? Sit back down?

“
Well, Ara,” Vicki placed her fork on her plate and folded her
fingers in front of her chin, “do you feel better now you’ve
effectively displayed your maturity in front of your
fourteen-year-old brother?”

My
arms fell to my sides. I just can’t believe it. I’ve had
enough—just about all a girl can take. Everything has gone so
wrong. First, I lose my mum and baby brother. Then, I get dragged
away from the only life I’ve ever known, brought to a new town with
one bag of my own things—thrown into a new school, where I meet a
guy who forces me to talk to him—to fall in
love
with him, only to have him tell
me he’s leaving me.

I
watched them all—waiting for me to respond. But I have no response.
Of
course
I don’t
feel better. What a stupid question to ask. I let my lip quiver and
my fists clenched tightly as tears blinded me.

They’ve been waiting for me to finally lose it. Well, they
just got their wish, didn’t they? They’ve pushed me too
far.

My
chair fell over and hit the wall as I pushed it out with the backs
of my legs and ran from the room.

“
Vicki, let her go,” Dad said calmly as I thudded up the
stairs, holding the ache across my gut with my forearm.

How
could they? How could they say things like that? I slammed my
bedroom door unintentionally hard, making my open window rattle,
sending vibrations through the house. Then, with a wailing breath,
gasping through the agony of my own fears and sorrows, I slid down
the door as my legs fell out from under me, and sat on the ground,
hugging my knees to my chest—trying to make myself as small as
possible.

What
now? What do I do now? I can’t breathe. I can’t even find a good
enough reason to breathe. I want to go home. I covered my face. I
just want to go home.

Tears, warm with the pain of losing my mother, the fear of
losing David and the ache of treachery my own father inflicted,
streamed over my cheeks and down my neck. I wiped them away, but
more came in their place.

I
hate my dad. In fact, I hate all of them. They’re probably down
there right now, shaking their heads, thinking they were right
about me—that I
was
going to lose it. But they’re wrong. This is
their
fault—they
made
me cry.

I
dug the balls of my palms into my eyes. Stop it, Ara-Rose—stop
crying. I need to stop crying. But then, what’s the point? Tears or
no tears, nothing ever changes.

I
rolled my head back against the door and let the warm liquid flow
down the sides of my face where it dried in tight lines. Since my
mum died, every tear I’ve cried has been for my own self-pity—for
the fact that they’re gone and I took them. But not these tears.
These are for David. For the fact that I’m losing him, for the fact
that his leaving has proved my fears—I’m cursed to lose everyone I
ever loved. I wish I could figure out what horrid crime I committed
in a past life, and atone for it. Then, maybe things would stop
hurting so much in this one.

Outside, the sunlight turned orange, and the soft yellow glow
that filled my room earlier slipped away into an empty blackness.
Tears turned my nose cold and my cheeks numb, and after a while, an
eerie rumble of thunder growled as a flash of white scorched the
sky for split second, then disappeared.

I
stayed motionless in my nightmare life, listening to the quiet
patter of rainfall that crept into my world under the cover of
night—afraid to move, afraid to cry anymore in case the brooding
storm should find me here.

The
familiar sound of doors being locked into place and lights flicked
off around the house filled the wordless evening with noise. My
parents’ footsteps thudded up the stairs, and while the lighter
ones continued down the hall, the heavy ones stopped by my door. My
heart picked up and I sank my face into crossed arms. Please don’t
come in, Dad.

“
I’m
sure she’s sleeping,” Vicki whispered. The footsteps faded to the
other end of the house, and silence swept over the night once more
as Dad’s bedroom door closed.

Feeling fragile from all the crying, I let the sudden cold of
night seep past my guard and wrap my bare shoulders as it filled
the room with its unwelcome chill.

If
my mum was here, my
real
mum, she’d tell me not to be silly. She’d tell me
to get up off the floor and get into bed, that when I wake in the
morning, everything will seem clear again.

A
part of me knows that, like a part of me knows I need to stop
feeling sorry for myself. But I miss her so much. I can’t help
feeling sorry for myself.

The
breath of composure I took escaped in a high-pitched squeal when a
loud crack of thunder struck the ground outside and lightning hit
barely a second after it. My mouth gaped and the corners of my lips
turned down, releasing my heaving breaths as inaudible squeaks. I
hate storms. There’s no way to control them. I can’t run away from
it and there’s no one to make it all okay—no best friend to sit and
talk to me and no Mum to hold me until it all blows over. I have
nowhere to hide anymore, and the worst thing is, I did this to
myself.

I
covered my head with my arms and cried into my knees as the thunder
struck again. Maybe I should call Mike. I’m sure he wouldn’t mind.
But my phone is all the way over there—at my desk—right near
the
open
window.

The
lightning flashed outside again, streaking the night with a
silvery-blue line. Cringing at the sight of my saturated homework
blowing around in the icy wind, I slid my hands up the wood of the
door, edging stiffly to my feet. My legs feel like jelly and my
butt is numb.

In
my head, I counted the seconds between the thunder, then, as soon
as it struck and grew silent again, I ran, wedged my fingers onto
the top of the wooden frame and slammed my window shut—drawing the
curtains together before the next strike of lightning. It hit as I
turned away. I squealed, stifling my cry under my hand, then
tripped all over myself to sit at the stool by my
dresser.

The
thunder sounded furious—rolling across the roof like the growl of a
hungry beast—angry, like me. As the rain fell harder, it drowned
out my sorrowful weeping with its soothing patter. I wish it’d been
this noisy while I was crying before, then no one would’ve heard
me.

The
same tiny bumps I felt when David was holding me today returned,
tightening my skin and raising the hairs along my arms. I rubbed my
shoulder and spun around on the dresser stool to face the
mirror.

With
the curtains closed, the darkness of my room swallowed up my
reflection—mirroring back only the outline of my head, shoulders,
and as the lightning flashed again, the image of my mother—smiling
down at the tiny baby in her arms. I lifted the photo frame from
the dresser and kissed them both, then wiped away the smudge my
lips left on the glass.

This
is my favourite photo—my only photo. I so clearly remember the day
I took it; Harry, who was about two months old, had just been
bathed, and my mum—I ran my fingers over her face—wrapped him
safely in a towel. Then, when she looked down at him again, I took
the shot—capturing the exact moment she saw her baby’s first real
smile. This is the way I’d like to remember them, but at night,
when I close my eyes, it’s the last seconds I ever saw them that
flash into my dreams—making the smiles and the sunlight fade from
nearly every memory.

Resting my bare forearms on the cold wood of the dresser,
exhausted from all of the crying, I dropped my head between my
hands and let the warm, salty tears fall over my nose and drip
away. “I’m so sorry, Mum,” I whispered to nothing. “I’m so,
so
sorry.”

The
sobs retreated to a still, breathless kind of composure, and my
eyes closed, heavy and stinging around the hot tears—failing to
block out the white flashes of light streaking through the gap in
my curtains.

As
the darkness of sleep came, the images in my head swirled, spinning
in the dizzying silence—and then, after a moment, after another
flash of lightning, I let my sorrows take me away on the tide of
regrets—into the darkness of a dreamless beyond.

A
brilliant, bright yellow light filled my room—beaming through the
crystals in front of the window and splashing tiny rainbows over my
walls. I lifted my head from the soft warmth of my
pillow.

That’s weird. I don’t remember getting into bed last night.
Dad must’ve moved me. I looked down at the red sundress still
covering my body, then over at my shoes—sitting neatly beside my
bedroom door.

Yup,
must’ve been Dad. Vicki would’ve put my shoes in the
closet.

Great, now I feel bad for yelling at him. He didn’t have to
come check on me, but I’m glad he did, otherwise I’d have a really
sore neck right now.

The
cold breeze of the approaching autumn stole the summer from the
morning and slammed my crystals against my window frame as it
entered my room, uninvited.

I
jumped out of bed, shut my window and drew my curtains
across—deliberately taking no notice of the grimy grey clouds
threatening to cover up the sun. It may be dreary outside, but
there’s no way there could be a heavier cloud hanging over my day
than the one that’s in my heart.

And
to make matters worse, it looks like a tsunami hit my desk last
night. I slumped in my desk chair with a loud groan and lifted my
soaked homework—trying to separate the dry pages from the wet ones,
then dropped them all with a huff of defeat.

It’s
no use; I’ll have to start all over again. How am I going to
explain this to my teachers, who already think I’m a first-class
slack-off? I dropped my head against my hand and rested my elbow
on the desk.

Maybe I should just stay home today. I don’t feel like being
a part of the world right now. Everything in my life that was once
worth living for is now gone—or thousands of miles on the other
side of the world.

After months of trying so hard to keep it together, to be
normal and move on, I’ve finally had enough. I can’t think of one
good reason to get dressed.