Page 33 of Broken Pieces

How can he possibly think that what I've always wanted is to be alone?

All I’ve wanted, since the day they let me into their lives was to be theirs, but I'm too much of a coward to admit that.

"I know you don't mean that. You're hurting, we all are…"

Maddox turns on his heel and storms back inside, his hands clenched into solid fists at his side ready to cause some damage.

The door slams in my face, before I have a chance to decide whether to chase after him or not.

Wringing my hands tightly around the bear, I trudge back to the car with tears burning my eyes. Reginald doesn’t say anything as I climb into the back seat. He would have overheard everything, but I can’t bring myself to look up, to see if there’s pity or disgust on his face.

As we drive away, everything becomes clearer in my head.

I wasn’t sure what I meant to them before, but now I know.

They hate me.

10

Max

One Year Later

She’s alive.

Violet's alive.

And she’s so fucking happy.

I spent weeks, maybe even months not sure if she was dead or alive, if what happened before the accident was even real.

Time has been a blur thanks to the pain that radiates from my right side and the meds that do nothing to dull it, but still make my mind hazy.

My strict railroaded life’s been torn apart and one of the most important pieces of it gone, just like that.

This is the first time I’ve seen her since I stopped her from being the one under that car's wheels.

She never came to visit me in the hospital and I had to hear from Dad that she’d left for college like she planned to. Mad couldn’t bring himself to tell me the news himself.

I’m not sure what he did to try and get her to stay or why she just decided to leave, but it doesn’t matter because she’ll be ours again soon.

How can she be so happy without us though?

Mad and I have been in pieces since she left. He doesn’t speak about her at all, refuses to acknowledge her existence if I ever try and bring her up.

He thought I died that night, he told me he couldn’t feel me, then when I woke up he felt every single thing I went through. The pain, the loss, the confusion. All of it.

Sometimes when my nerves flare up I see him clutch his own arm without even realizing it. We've always been so closely connected and I know he needs me now more than ever, to help keep him together.

That night, I thought we were about to lose her. As she ran from us and I saw the headlights, I did the only thing I could and pushed her into Mad’s arms. I thought she’d be safe with him, that if I was gone they’d help put each other back together.

But Mad needs me more than I realized. As he helped me with my recovery, I could see how much he was struggling with everything.

Although he refuses to admit that part of that pain is because he misses Violet so deeply.

There’s a hole where Violet used to be. A silent empty void that lingers between us. Some nights we go to bed together and imagine she’s there, back in the center of our world.

The agony of knowing she left and has made the choice not to even call or visit once, hurts more than my fucked up body.