Page 3 of Fractured Heart

“No, you’re not!” Father reaches forward and curls his fingers around my heart-shaped pendant.

“No, please. Father, don’t,” I beg, and instantly regret it. He’ll stop at nothing now that he knows exactly how to hurt me.

“You’re useless,” he shouts, yanking hard, and the chain snaps. I grab for it and Father shoves me away with enough force to knock me to the floor.

I slam onto the hard ceramic tiles. Father takes a step forward and I already know what comes next. “Please, Father. I promise I won’t do it again!”

Father laughs, a cruel glint in his glazed eyes. He sways a little and my necklace slips from his fingers.

For a second, I think it’s accidental. That he’s so far gone that he dropped it and I’ll be able to get it back.

Just as that sliver of hope forms, he slams his sneakered foot on my pendant. “Useless!” he shouts. “Just. Like. Your. Mother!” He stomps on my onyx heart, punctuating each word as his foot connects with the stone.

“No!” I cry out, lunging to rescue my heart. I know I should stay put. If I wait for Father’s anger to pass, I’ll be safe. But what good is safe when he’s stomping on my heart? Destroying the pendant Mom slipped into my hand in the hospital, just before her body went limp? How can anything else matter?

With a pained cry, I grab Father’s ankle. He retaliates by kicking me in the stomach, hard. The air escapes my lungs in a whoosh of pain and I double over from the impact. Father advances, kicking me again. He hits me right in the gut and pain reverberates down my back as I’m pinned against the fridge. I curl up in a ball to protect myself as Father swings his foot back. Squeezing my eyes shut, I prepare for an onslaught of pain that never comes.

Something clatters into the living room. Mom’s pendant!

I jump to my feet, barely registering the pain as I race in pursuit. I drop to my hands and knees, frantic to find it. A loud belch echoes from the kitchen and the floorboards creak as Father stumbles into the living room. The possibility of him attacking me and the constant reminder from my throbbing ribcage are nothing compared the horror of not finding my necklace.

For a second, I think it’s vanished, like magic, but then I spot the onyx stone in front of the faded brown couch. I let out a breath I hadn’t realized I’d been holding and scramble forward. Then, I see what Father’s done and let out a strangled cry.

A spider web of jagged lines runs across the pendant’s surface. When I pick it up, it breaks apart in my hand—four pieces of a fractured heart.

Chapter 2

“Where do you think you’re going?” Father shouts when I stagger to my feet and stumble toward the front door. “Get back here!”

“No!” I close my hand in a tight fist. The jagged pieces of my fractured heart pendant dig painfully into my palm. There’s something comforting in the sting—something that urges me to keep moving.

“You’ll be back, Roonie Hill,” Father calls after me. “You’ll be back…you mark my words.”

“Never!”

“You have nowhere to go. Nowhere, Roonie!”

“I don’t care,” I sob. Anywhere is better than here, and the only thing that matters right now is getting away.

I try to move quickly despite the pain, afraid Father will attack me again. He doesn’t. He doesn’t even bother coming after me. His footsteps recede as he heads back to the kitchen and I hear his satisfied belch.

Tears blur my vision. When I stumble into the night, the cold air stings my wet cheeks. My footsteps echo on the unforgivingly hard pavement. Each step sends waves of pain shooting up my injured back and ribs.

I don’t care. I need to get away—away from my thoughts, away from my old life, and away from Father.

He’s right about one thing, though. I don’t have anywhere to go. No close friends or neighbors to take me in and no other family. My high school classmates all got into college and moved away. I’m sure a few of them would let me visit, but I have no way of reaching them. I left my phone next to the bathroom sink and I didn’t take my wallet.

All I’ve got are the clothes on my back and my fractured heart.

I should turn back, but I don’t.

I stumble along past house after house until I reach a brightly-lit front-facing window. Inside, a little girl with brown hair just like mine is seated on her mother’s lap, a large picture book propped open in front of them. As they flip the page, I picture a fairy tale unfolding—a story with handsome princes and happy endings. It reminds me of my own childhood. Of my own mom.

When the woman pulls the little girl in for a hug, I remember what it felt like to be loved.

A gust of harsh wind blasts past and chills me to the bone. It whips my messy brown hair at my face and I suddenly feel like a cursed mermaid, tangled in unruly seaweed. I must look like a mess. My face, usually pale, turns red when I cry. My eyes must be puffy, and I feel snot running down my face, too. I wipe it away with the sleeve of my pink sweater and stare down at Mom’s pendant. The four jagged onyx pieces stare back at me, each one a cold, sharp reminder of why I left home.

I rearrange them carefully on my palm, forming the shape of a heart. The pieces fit together, but there’s no hiding the cracks that connect them—no hiding how my heart is no longer whole.