Broken

by A. E. Rought

“Happy to help.” Alex opens his locker just as quickly, without the extra tweaks. His voice has a tinny edge when he speaks with his head inside it. “You sound like that’s a problem, though.”

  How can I tell him how easily he opens my locker creeps me out? And since Daniel’s fall from that balcony, I haven’t relied on guys, or let them get close enough to have my locker combination.

  “N-not really a problem,” I stammer, even though on some level it really is. “Now I feel like I should say I’m sorry.” And I hate that word.

  I turn and then force myself to organize my books for homework tonight. Shards of hurt grind in the knuckles of my right hand with every movement. Great. Mom will be in a tizzy over this. Probably drag me to the med clinic, too. I hate that place, always crowded, people coughing, and at least one baby screaming.

  “No worries. I’m new here,” Alex says, spinning his lock once after closing his locker. “And God knows if Carrot Top was always hounding me, I think I would want to open that locker and climb in it.”

  A little snicker sneaks from me. “Josh is annoying.” And probably hates Alex already.

  “What’s up with him, if I can ask?”

  “Long story.” I wince when my knuckles throb with heartbeats of their own as I sling my backpack over my shoulder. “Ouch.”

  Alex’s eyebrows furrow. “May I?” he asks at the same time he takes my right hand in his.

  The touch is soft, hardly a murmur of contact, but the hair on my arm stands like I’m stroking a plasma globe. Little electric shocks zing from each of his fingers. Speech dries in my throat. I can hardly think when he’s touching me, like everything’s on short circuit in my brain. Alex turns my hand, tingles following his fingertips as he gently probes my knuckles, already darkening and swelling. His index finger glides across my hand up to the pale broken heart, then back to my knuckles.

  “These look broken,” he pronounces, and releases my hand. “I can drive you home.”

  No way. Say it, Emma. I can’t spit it out.

  “Drive me home?” I turn and walked toward the side door, putting needed distance between us. I don’t need to look to know he’s following. I feel him over my shoulder. My short question drags him along behind me like bait. “You asked me to save you a seat at lunch, then you don’t sit there. If I accept the ride, you’ll just leave me hanging.”

  “What?” He bursts out, a hint of incredulity in his voice. “That doesn’t make any sense.”

  I push open the side door. Clouds litter the sky. Wind gusts rattle the skeletal branches above us. Rich leather scent whisks past me on the wind as Alex shrugs into his jacket he’s carried since I walked away from the lockers. Rueful regret fills me, and I long for the sweatshirt Daniel had draped over my shoulders minutes before the accident.

  “Makes perfect sense to me.” I can’t accept a ride from Alex, despite the deepening hurt in my hand or the chill biting at me. Something’s off with him. Something’s off with me around him. “Besides, I need to go to the library and check out a book for my English Lit class.”

  “Okay fine. You have homework.” He huffs a little breath. “It’ll be hard to write with a broken hand.”

  “What do you think you are?” I shoot him a look over my shoulder and instantly regret it. He’s tall, ridiculously handsome with concern softening his features. I jerk my gaze forward. If I stumbled walking and talking at night, I don’t want to see what walking and looking at Alex Franks could do to me. “You some kind of doctor now?”

  “Nope.” He stops walking by the side of the gym, an invisible tether between us pulling me to a halt. “My dad is though. He took care of me after...after I got hurt this spring.”

  “Oh. Sorry,” I offer out of reflex. A pulse of hurt minces in my knuckles when I push strands of blond from my eyes. “I’ll have my mom take me to the clinic when I get home, okay?”

  “Then let me give you a ride.” His hood slips from his long shaggy hair with the next gust of wind. His left eye pinches a little tighter as he squints against the sunlight. “You’ll get your hand taken care of quicker.”

  “Persistent, aren’t you?”

  His smile is sudden, and wicked. “I can be.”

  “So can I,” I say and motion for him to move along. “It’s definitely a no thanks.”

  A sigh escapes Alex, accompanied by a shake of his head. I can’t stop from watching the sunlight slide over his brown hair, and set alight his coppery highlights.

  “Y’know, there’s not much difference between stubborn and persistent,” he says, hooking his hood with a finger and pulling it back up. The motion exposes a scar running from his wrist, down his forearm. I blink, and falter a moment, my mind stuck on the white track in his skin.

  “True.” Then I shake my head and come back with, “But stubborn sounds so negative, and I don’t know you that well. Thanks for the offer, Alex.”

  The hood slips over his eyebrows and buries his eyes in shade when he gives me a mock bow. “Another time then?”

  “Possibly.”

  “Then I’ll see you at your equally stubborn locker tomorrow.” He winks. “Bye, Emma.”

  “Later, Alex.”

  I slump against the cool brick half-wall running the length of the gymnasium. Alex shouldn’t look back—it would be better for both of us—but he casts me a brief glance once he reaches the corner. He lifts his hand in a hesitant wave. I return it and a smile warms the inside of his cowl. The image of his scar slashes through my mind, cutting open veins of questions. What happened? Was that from surgery? Did he do it? Are the rumors right? Why does he do things like Daniel?

  Why does he wake up my broken heart?Chapter Five

  Once Alex’s car, a black electric/fuel hybrid, pulls into the flow of traffic fleeing the school, I use my left hand to claw my cell phone from my backpack pocket. Alex’s warning that something’s already broken in my right hand keeps me from using it. Still, I can’t resist compounding the pain, and give Josh a heartfelt middle finger salute when he roars past in his rusty Z-28.

  Weak sun glints from the display screen as I turn the phone on and press 1 for Home. One ring, then two. A third before Mom picks up the other end of the line. Dishes clatter in the background when she says, “Hello?”

  “Hi, Mom.” I fight the urge to cry. “Can you come get me? I hurt my hand today and I think it might be broken.”

  “Broken?” Her tone rings with surprise. “I’ll be right there.”

  “Right there,” ends up being long enough for me to stuff my phone away, regret not wearing a warmer jacket, and wish Daniel was here instead of the non-existent jacket.

  As Mom’s faded gold sedan pulls to the curb, she reaches through the car and opens the passenger side door for me. Her face is a frowning, furrowed mask of concern. Internally I cringe, bracing for the bitch-out I know is coming. Mom’s best vent for worry is yelling, usually at who she’s worried about. As expected, when I drop my butt into the front seat she throws a proper fit, wanting to know how it happened, why I wasn’t more careful, blah blah blah.

  I’m too far gone into the pain, and don’t want to admit I punched my locker in frustration. She’d just yell more, tell me I should’ve seen the counselor when they offered it. And maybe she’s right. A lump forms in my throat and tears burn their way over my lashes. Her tizzy fizzles. Underneath the stoplight a few blocks from the med clinic, she reaches across the gulf of the empty seat between us and pats my leg.

  A wall had appeared between us after Daniel died. I’d hoarded my hurt and loss, and wouldn’t let her fix it. I’d slammed my door more times than I ever should’ve. Mom was always there, waiting, ready to put me back together if I fell apart.

  I never crumbled where she could see.

  Now, the pain grinds in my knuckles and undercuts my grasp on control. I loosen my crossed arms, and thread my fingers in Mom’s. Her gentle Mom sounds bring me to my sniveling weakest. My will disintegrates. The smell of cookies rises from her sleeve wh
en I put my head on her shoulder.

  Somehow she knows these tears aren’t just over my hand. Mom presses her cheek to the top of my head, silken rustles following the motion as she coddles me.

  Wet heat slicks my face, my bottom lip trembles and the hollow in my chest hurts. Yearning aches in me, pushing me to cry on her like I did when I was little. Movement is beyond me. Motion, thought, speech—anything—and I’m going to fall apart. Mom pulls her hand from mine and guides me until she cradles my head in her lap. She whispers over and over, “You’re going to be okay.”

  Okay.

  It’s such a lovely promise.

  Promises are like hearts, easily broken.

  There, on her lap like I wish I’d been four months ago, the last of my resolve cracks and the sobs finally break free. Guilt roils up and I know I should stop, she doesn’t deserve to drown in my misery. How do you close the floodgates once they’re open? Mom puts the car in park, leaves the engine running and weathers the storm with me. I’m not Emma anymore, just hurt and loss and anguish in a sack of skin and possibly broken bones. Emotion scores my insides, scrapes them out with the force of a tidal wave.

  I cry for Daniel, my heart breaking, my mind bleeding memories I’ve tried so hard to keep buried. The look of terror, the loss in his eyes… It’s gouged into my soul.

  I cry for myself, the miserable shell I’ve been without him here.

  I cry for everyone I’ve hurt withdrawing from life.

  Mom never stops stroking my shoulder, or my hair, a gentle contact anchoring me. I pull in a slow, deep cooling breath and realize the hurt has lessened. I feel scraped and stinging inside, gutted like the jack-o’-lantern sitting on the ground outside the clinic door. Except somewhere in the aching emptiness I see a spark, a flicker of my own, the light Daniel would’ve wanted me to finally find.

  Hope.

  Stupid me, I try to push to a sitting position using my right hand, then yelp out a cry of pain. Mom whips her seatbelt off so fast the buckle whacks the window. She cradles my hand, barely touching it, with none of the electric tingles that came from Alex’s fingers. Sighing, she releases my hand to cup my cheeks, turns me to meet her brown eyes. I’m torn open, exposed as she searches my face, and I imagine her hunting for a glimmer of who I was before.

  I see the glow inside. Will she?

  A soft curve lifts the wrinkly corners of Mom’s mouth. Her nod is subtle. “There’s my girl.”

  My smile looks strained and weak in the rearview mirror. At least it’s real. Hairs shift by my face from her sigh. She wipes at my tears with her thumb, so inadequate to the deluge that wets my cheeks. I think Mom realizes it’s a losing battle, because she fishes in her purse for a clean tissue, then dries my face.

  “You’re going to be okay,” she repeats.

  The solid empty feeling you get after a good cry rocks in my head when I nod. This time, I believe her.

  Shoulders sagging, hand aching, I slink behind her through the lengthening afternoon shadows toward the entrance. The pumpkin’s candle flickers and dies in the displaced air of the opening door.

  Inside the clinic, the smell of carpet cleaner and rubbing alcohol accosts my nose. Off-white walls hem in people in varying shades of pale to puce to sickly green. A particularly snot-coated kid wipes his boogers across his sleeve then smiles with gaps missing between his teeth.

  Mom signs my name on the Emergency Care list, then we take two chairs across from the banks of glass windows separating the wounded and contagious from the care takers. My backpack slides to the floor, feet away from the door the nurse pops out of to call in patients. Looking at my swollen, bruised writing hand, I can’t help but fret over how I’ll do my class work, my homework… Heck, how am I going to shower or wash my hair?

  My lips part to ask Mom those questions the same moment my cell phone rings.

  I think every person behind the divider window glares daggers at me. Heat floods my cheeks and throat, and I contemplate hiding in my hood like Alex Franks does as I yank my phone from the pocket to shut it off.

  The flashing green lets me know it’s a call from Bree before I stab the power button with my left index finger.

  A surly looking nurse steps through the door and calls my name. Mom jumps up, and follows me into the warren of halls and identical rooms. Fear niggles in me, claws up my spine. The doctor will touch, prod, and possibly realign my hand.

  I step on the scale. The nurse slides the height guide to the top of my head, then makes note of my height and records my weight, before ushering Mom and I into a little room. Refusing to sit on a table sized for toddlers, I sit in the chair. An exasperated snort escapes my Mom, then the paper lining the table crinkles when she slides onto it.

  After a few minutes of hurting and hating my “juvenile themed” room, the door swings open. A tall, stern-looking man with graying hair and wire rim glasses strides in. His dour expression reminds me of a mortician. His white lab coat has no name embroidered, no name tag.

  Doctor Nobody moves with ease, a fake smile edging into his cheeks. Something about him looks familiar, only my emotionally-drained brain refuses to make the connection.

  “So,” he says, no formal greeting, “hurt your hand, Emma?”

  “Yeah.” I lift my right hand, putting the purple-blue puff in full view. “A guy at school said he thought it was broken.”

  “Really?” I wish he sounded interested, instead of almost annoyed. Doctor Nobody exudes an aura of doing me a huge favor as he sits on the little rolling stool, and scoots closer. He takes my hand, jolts of pain shooting from where he prods and presses in between my knuckles. A wheeze escapes me. “Sorry,” he says. “Your friend must be very smart.”

  Or he saw me punch my locker. “Alex said his dad is a doctor.”

  “Is that true?” His eyebrows creep up, and his voice drops in timbre.

  “Yes, sir.”

  Suddenly, he goes from a Nobody to a Somebody and I’m wishing we’d gone to the Emergency Room instead. The doctor’s grip tightens on my hand enough to draw another wheeze from me. The thickness of his lenses sharpens his gaze to a scalpel as he scours my face. The pressure increases, knuckles grinding, tears burning in my eyes. Then, bones break with a crunch. I bite off a strangled cry as my head spins with the fresh pain. Mom steps closer with a sound of alarm.

  “Well, Alex must be a lucky boy.” Doctor Somebody releases me, and jerks upright from the stool fast enough for his lab coat to snap with the motion. He steps closer, actually hovering above me, pinning me with a stare. “We’re going to need X-rays. You’re not pregnant, are you?”

  “Now just wait a minute,” Mom barks, glowering.

  “Of course not!” I snap at the same moment. He hurt me and I can’t shake the feeling it was intentional. But why?

  “Sorry, Mrs. Gentry.” His voice is slick, quasi-comforting. “It’s protocol to ask.”

  And he sweeps out of the room.

  Mom and I stare wide-eyed at each other, neither of us breathe. When she finally exhales, her eyebrows sink, her color comes up, pinking her cheeks. Then, she storms out, on the hunt for Dr. Somebody, I’m sure.

  The emptiness of the room presses in, threatening to crush me. Indentations of his fingers press into my swollen skin. Ache throbs deep in the joints and just behind, in the bones of my hand. My throat tightens, a lump rises I struggle to swallow.

  I’ve never seen a stranger react so violently to a guy’s name. Unless, the doctor’s not a stranger to Alex…

  Half-formed questions crowd my head. Who is…why was he…what’s his problem?

  Edgy, ugly pieces are starting to fit together in my head. I rise from the chair, pacing and puzzling. There has to be a connection between Dr. Somebody and Alex. Doesn’t there?

  An orderly pops open the door, and whisks me through the twisty, short maze of halls to the X-Ray lab. A cold, dark, unfriendly room as unwilling to give up information on the doctor as my tired, stressed-out brain.The X-ray tech ch
atters amiably and emptily, using a practiced script of what she’s doing rather than engage in real conversation as she arranges my hand, slides films in to the machine, and steps behind the wall to take the picture.

  “Hey, um… Tech Girl, do you know which physician ordered the X-rays?”

  She mutters something on her side of the wall, then crosses the dim lit space and pulls the films. Holding them to the light board, she says, “He’s a brilliant surgeon. Donates his time here. Ah,” she nods, “two different sets of breaks. Looks like you’re getting an immobilizer.”

  Two different sets? “Oh goodie.”

  Before I can ask her who the psychopath “brilliant surgeon” is who must have given me the second set, she says, “Dr. Franks.”

  The name hits with a sick, sinking kind of weight. I didn’t hear her right. I couldn’t. At least, part of me does not want to believe it.There must be more Dr. Franks in Muskegon County, right?

  “Excuse me?” I ask.

  “The doctor who ordered your x-ray,” she answers. “His name is Dr. Franks. He volunteers time here.”

  The bottom drops out of my gut. I blink at Tech Girl in a numb kind of shock.

  That horrid man is Alex’s father?

  Before I can ask if he has a son, she picks up her work phone, barking orders to someone and guides me back to the room. My feet drag, my brain churns. Disbelief rings in my hollowed core.

  Mom’s waiting for me. Her eyebrows are crashed together and casting storm clouds in her eyes. The weight of her gaze strokes the back of my hand, but the doctor’s fingerprints are gone. She reaches out an arm, offering me shelter. The hurt and fear rising inside drives me to her side, a cub to a mother lioness. She’s nearly through explaining how she bitched out the ladies behind the desk and then lodged a formal complaint when another doctor opens the door.

  This man is young, reedy, with dark hair and watery blue eyes. His embroidered lab coat proclaims him to be a D.O. by the name of Jonathan Yates.

  A fraction of the tension wiring through me releases, but I can’t win free of the horrid shock snipping my thoughts short. Mom gives my shoulder a reassuring pat. Dr. Yates is gentle, considerate, and explains everything. He verifies Tech Girl’s comment about two different breaks, one close to the knuckles consistent with hitting something, and one’s further back in the carpal-somethings consistent with crushing. He continues with the reason he’s the one putting the hard metal brace under my hand and strapping it into a stiff immobilizer.