Broken Wing (Arthur Academy Book 1)

by Kathleen Mareé

  About

  Hendrix:

  It’s funny the things you notice as a child.

  Like the way people uneasily glance away from me whenever I catch their eye.

  Or the way a stranger seems to smile happily at other children, but when I say hello, their smile looks more uneasy than warm.

  But as I approach the steel gates to the elite Arthur Academy, I can’t help but take a long-awaited breath towards my freedom. Finally, I have the chance to build the life I want. A future. Something that gives me more to live for than the daily beatings my childhood only knew. The girl I used to be doesn’t exist here. But even as the confidence grows about a life I now have control over, I can’t help but feel there could be something else waiting for me here. Something I’ve never faced before.

  And it isn’t something I could prepare for.

  And preparation is what got me out. It got me here.

  I can’t afford to lose this opportunity, because if I lose this hand, it’s more than just a loss.

  It’s like not being able to breathe. Not being able to fly.

  It’s like, having a broken wing.

  And without it, I lose my control. My freedom.

  Paxton:

  I grip the leather ball in my hand, finally feeling the weight of the year pressing down on me. If it was just football, I could deal, but with my last name – it's everything else that suffocates me. The Arthur Elite is what they call us, and we each have our roles to play. But my fathers’ given me the next two years to do what the hell I want without his interference, before he’ll own me to be his pawn.

  Two years. After that, when college is done, I dread the life I’ll have to lead. The role I’ll have to play.

  It should be simple. Just stroll through the steel gates and be the crown they all see; but I can’t help but feel there is something lurking beneath the surface. There is something different about this year that I sense inside my dark soul.

  And it isn’t something I am prepared for; even when staying ahead is the one thing that ensures my next breath.

  Because when I lose a hand, it’s more than just a loss.

  It’s like losing a limb. A bird breaking its’ wing.

  And without that - I can’t fly toward freedom.

  And my freedom right now, is all I have to hold onto.

  Broken Wing

  An Arthur Academy Novel – Book One

  Hendrix

  By Kathleen Maree’

  Copyright © Kathleen Mareé 2021

  License Notes

  No reproduction without permission. All rights reserved.

  This title is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This title may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this title with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  Disclaimer: The persons, places, things, and otherwise animate or inanimate objects mentioned in this novel are figments of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to anything or anyone living (or dead) is unintentional. The author humbly begs your pardon. This is fiction, people.

  **This novel contains possible triggers and sensitive topics**

  Before

  A broken wing is only what’s seen on the outside…

  It’s funny the things you notice as a child.

  Like the way people uneasily glance away from me whenever I catch their eye.

  Or the way a stranger seems to smile happily at other children, but when I say hello, their smile looks more uneasy than warm.

  The same way the kind lady at the local store, grits her teeth angrily at mama when we buy our bread; her eyes are sad when I take our large bag in my small hand. I’m not sure why she looks at us that way, but everyday it’s the same. I don’t ask mama why. The one time I did she got upset, and daddy didn’t like it when I made mama cry.

  I tug down the worn long sleeve, when the bright blue bruise peeks out on my wrist. I glance up at mama as she has stern words with the lady, making sure she didn’t see it. The one time I wore my sundress because it was so hot outside, was the day mama wouldn’t look at me. Every time she tried to, she just cried and cried. I think it’s because of the marks daddy leaves on my skin when he gets really mad at me. He tells me it’s because I need to learn how to behave and be a good grown up one day. I try really, really hard to be such a good girl. I take a deep breath when I see mama still talking to the lady, as it means she didn’t see it today.

  I smile.

  When mama tugs harshly on my hand, the bag almost falls from my grasp but I hold on as tightly as I can. My short legs move as fast as they can to keep up with mamas’ fast pace down the sidewalk, her head firmly on the cracked ground beneath us. This is my favourite part of the day though, so my eyes are as high as they can go. The blue sky, and the sun shining above us is so pretty, and the main street is always full of so many people. There’s so much to look at here, far more than the attic I’m left in most of the time. Mama says it’s safer up there, so I can just play with my toys and make noise without making daddy angry, but it’s so dark too that sometimes I find it hard to see at all.

  But here….? I take a big breath, grinning at the world surrounding us.

  “Hi.”

  A small boy with sandy-hair and freckles says as we approach one another. I automatically smile up at him. He looks nice, in tidy clean clothes, and even has shoes on his feet too. I’m not sure why, but not many of the kids around here wear shoes; just like I don’t. In fact, you don’t see many other kids around here that look as perfect as he does. I’ve only ever seen kids like him on television. My eyes light up when I look at him, and his crooked smile and brown eyes smiling widely at me.

  “I like your shirt,” I reply, admiring the shiny buttons that are pressed down the middle. Daddy has a shirt like that which he wears when he goes out. But those are the nights I need to stay as quiet as a mouse because when he gets home he smells funny and is angrier than ever. Those are the nights that I try to forget, because that seems to be when I’m the biggest disappointment to him.

  As his mother swaps hands with the young boy as we pass, I have to glance past his mother to keep my warm smile on him. His mother mustn’t like me staring as she hisses something at the boy, and as I glance over my shoulder, so does the boy, causing our eyes to meet once more.

  And just as I start feeling like todays been the best day ever, I trip over a ragged edge in the pavement, and our grocery bag that I was tugging behind me goes sprawling onto the ground.

  “Hendrix, what have you done?!” Mama snaps, getting on her hands and knees and tugging the broken contents back into the bag.

  “I’m so sorry Mama, I’m sorry.” I reach down to help her, my eyes starting to water. But when I glance up at her, she is staring down at me sadly, because her eyes….

  Oh no!

  Her eyes are strained hard on my exposed wrist where my shirt has creeped up my arm and the bright blue and purple marks are well on display. I tug it down quickly, my heart rate leaping in my chest.

  “Mama?” I ask softly, causing her eyes to leak fresh tears of her own. She doesn’t reply. But she stands slowly, and gently takes my hand, walking much slower towards our house at the end of the street. And with every slow and steady step we take, the more my teeth begin to chatter. I know what happens when mama walks through the door like this. I know how mad daddy will be when he sees I made mama cry. I bow my head. If only I hadn’t been looking at that boy, I would have been watching where I was walking.

  And now?

  Now I had to learn how to be a grown up, because grown-ups didn’t ma
ke so many mistakes like I did. Today, I would have to be taught another lesson.

  If only that would be the worst lesson I would ever learn…

  Chapter One

  Hendrix

  The world flickered by like something out of the twilight zone, as it blinked at me full-speed through the rear glass window. The shallow, short breath which was my lungs usual rhythm, slowly grew calmer the further away my old world seemed to slip by. By the time the bus stopped and I stepped out onto the curb, I took what felt like my first deep breath in my entire 17 years. And then I saw it.

  The prestigious Arthur Academy.

  My new home for the next four years of my life. A home where no memories would haunt me at every corner, or a mere door would taunt me with what lay behind it. I could be freer here. I could finally breathe again. All the pain, hurt and hard work I went through just to get through each and every day, so I could graduate a year early with a full ride to this place, finally…. finally, seemed worth it all. Every scar, every heartache, and every single breath all came down to this moment and before I even realised, a small smile had crossed my face in God knows how long.

  Oomph!

  I’m knocked to the ground in an awkward heap, my hands thankfully breaking my fall and my black-frame glasses landing beside me on the concrete.

  “Oh shit, my bad. Are you okay?”

  My palm hovers above my glasses, when a tanned, perfectly manicured hand plucks them from beneath my grasp and waves them in front of my face. Whether this stranger is urging me to take them or whether she’s taunting me, I have no idea, but I’ve learned to keep my guard up regardless.

  “I’m fine thanks,” I reply curtly, before carefully taking them from her and placing them back on my face. I may be small, but a few scrapes on my hands and knees are nothing I can’t handle. I’m far too used to it. Unfortunately.

  “Oh, thank God. Otherwise my hour meditation this morning for clarity and positivity was all for nothing. Not to mention my mantra for getting through this semester which has lasted for a whole week so far – would have also literally been for nothing too. Especially if I break the new girl in only the second week of classes. You are new right? I don’t remember seeing you around last week when classes started…? Although it’s a huge campus and all, but you look... New.”

  I don’t take her offered hand, and stand on my own, brushing the invisible dirt from my thigh as I do. And despite her voice sounding warm, I didn’t miss the way her brown eyes roam my pale-grey pinafore and black doc martens. I didn’t dress like lots of girls my age in my poorer home-town, and from the quick glance of this strangers flawless put-together appearance in her Academy uniform – I didn’t dress anything like the girls at this place either. I would’ve thought that the strangest thing I would come across here was the fact that a college even made their students wear a uniform. I mean, it wasn’t military school. But as long as I didn’t have to pay for it, I would dance around in a monkey suit if that’s what it took to be here. But a quick glance around the impeccable campus surrounding me and I knew it wouldn’t only be the uniform that I would find a little unusual here. This place was beyond anything I saw on the net or in my welcome brochure. It was intimidating- meets-ethereal with its’ perfectly sculpted lawns and bricked-buildings that I would think belonged in the English countryside and not this side of North America.

  “Yeah, well, I haven’t sorted out the uniform yet. I only arrived this morning.”

  “Oh well in that case, let me escort you to administration. It’s the least I can do after almost breaking your face and all. I didn’t though, right? Break your face I mean?”

  The soft smile crosses my face before I can stop it, but I can’t help but feel self-conscious as I scan her impeccable appearance in more detail this time. Her shiny Auburn ringlets that bounced perfectly just below her ears was a far contrast to my thick black hair that was side-braided down my left shoulder. From her grey-plaid short skirt that she teamed effortlessly with white socks that rested just below her knee, to her black mary-janes and tight-white button-down that revealed a tasteful amount of cleavage. This girl couldn’t be dressed further from my look if she tried. She looked like a damn supermodel whilst I looked like I escaped some edgier version of the Sound of Music. And not a fashionable version either.

  “No, the face is fine. Well, as fine as it could be anyway…” I added sombrely, before brushing it off and stepping toward the building ahead before she can reply.

  “Okay, well that’s great. Means I won’t have to beg forgiveness from my spirit guides so early in the semester. So…. you’re not a transfer, right? Freshman?” She asks inquisitively as she scurries beside me, the click-clack of her mary-janes quickening on the pavement to catchup.

  “Yeah freshman.”

  “I figured.” I side-eyed her as we walked side by side, wondering what she meant by that comment. My guard was always up without me really even trying anymore, but she was a chatty, bubbly thing, that I didn’t have to wait long for her to continue.

  “I mean, you look young, obvs, but school started a week ago and most of the students here come straight from the sister school Arthur Grammar after they graduate. Like moi,” she adds with a fake accent, as she touches the skin playfully between her breasts. “The schools are run by the same high-classed and over prestigious suits that run this town. It’s unusual for newbies to be here unless they are the chosen few scholarship kids. You know, it keeps the high and mighty seem like they are giving back to society and all…” she rolls her eyes as she says this.

  “So, what does that make you then? You said you came from the sister school, so you’re not on scholarship like I am.”

  She smiles. “No, I’ve been raised with these creatures my whole life unfortunately. I can’t escape them, not until I escape this town and really disappoint my father. I can’t wait to see his face when I move to California and become an actress, and marry some poor stunt guy who knows how to manoeuvre in the sheets, before I am divorced and onto husband number two. Maybe a producer who wants to revive my struggling acting career.”

  “You sound like you have it all figured out,” I mutter as we take the stairs to the overwhelming double doors. The mention of her escaping piques my interest. Whilst we have different reasons for wanting our escapes, I can’t help the longing that rises in my chest about what this move really means for me. It’s a total new start. A start where no one knows me. Where no one knows about my past, about my family. Where I’m not that girl. Where I can finally be someone else. Finally.

  We push our way into the crowded hall and I’m met with what can be only described as what you would assume was the inside of a palace. The shiny, white marble floor offset by walnut-timber doors and trims, where even the lockers lining each wall bounce the light off its shiny black surface like they have their own spotlight. There are bodies everywhere, but there is no morning-buzz that I would’ve assumed I would find so early in a new college year. It’s more like a still-kind of chaos. You know, like the calm before the storm; or a herd of prey, silently waiting for a lion to strike. Students are lined against the lockers on either side, in small cliques, glancing at us as we stride by. I can hear the whispers, and see the accompanying salty looks from these beautiful people who just reek of money and ego. All of them dressed in similar variations of the white-grey uniform, and all finished with the maroon blazer and gold Arthur Academy emblem.

  “Wow, its like an anti-welcoming committee,” I mutter, just only realising that the girl is still striding confidently beside me.

  “Oh, don’t worry about these snobs. Honestly, most of the people here are one-dimensional. They have one thing on their mind and one thing only…”

  I couldn’t help the unease that rose when I thought about these good-looking people only thinking about sex, or drugs, or whatever other one-thing they have access to. But that was before she replied with, “Power.” It’s only ever about being seen, and who you are seen with in
whatever way that may be. Bunch of lemmings.”

  “So, what makes you so different to them? Didn’t you say you were all raised together?” I ask, ignoring a louder sneer as I pass a group of girls who could give Mean Girls a run for their money.

  “The difference my friend, is that I know this is all a façade. It’s not real, well not really anyway. And once they finish, graduate and move into their family businesses or arranged marriage where their new husband is having sex with the nanny - all of this will mean nothing because it’s only ever what our parents want that matters.” She pauses, a hint of sadness to her tone before she bitterly adds, “Which is why I want to get as far away from this place and these people as I can.”

  As we near the end of the corridor, we are about to make a left, when I peer slightly over my shoulder. The lines of students planted down the sides of both lockers have all but forgotten my presence as each and every pair of eyes is strained hard on the front doors we just came through. You could hear a pin drop by how silent the echoed whispers were now, as if they were waiting with baited breaths for something, or someone, to come through those doors.

  “It’s like, they are waiting there for something,” I mumble completely confused by what I was witnessing.

  “Of course, they are. Arthur Academy doesn’t just have self-pretentious suits running this place, but their spawn as well. It’s always the same. No one can do anything in this place without their permission.”

  “Without whose permission?” I ask, as the double doors open and the light from outside streams in. The suns glow, illuminating four figures like they rose from the gods themselves, before I lose sight of them after turning the corner.

  “The Arthur Elite.”

  I don’t have time to ask my new stranger-friend anything further, before I am ushered inside a room, and faced with a lady with a high bun, and narrow glasses perched on the tip of her nose. All but forgetting the strange scene I just walked through.