Hollow Hearts (The Harkwright Trilogy)

“I have to go on Monday for a… final interview. If I’m accepted officially, then I may not be back for a while, I don’t know if I’m ready to say goodbye to everyone just yet,” I’m wringing my hands in my lap and I can see him get up in my peripheral before he folds himself down in the chair beside me and takes both of my hands this time.

“That’s in three days, how long will you be gone for?” He asks and I’m trying not to fool myself into believing I see disappointment shimmering back at me.

“I’m not sure, they haven’t said. I guess they want to prepare their students for the next chapter in their life. All I care about is getting to a position where I can help Poppy and in turn my mom. I don’t even know why I’m telling you all of this, guess it’s the whole doctor thing,” I say with a nervous laugh, unable to sweep any more hair behind my ear with him holding my hand.

“Maybe or it’s because you feel happy and comfortable around me, I know it’s that way for me,” his eyes are intense and I feel naked, I don’t really know what to say in reply but his beeper saves me from having to think on the spot.

“I swear, every time I get you alone, I get called away,” he says it like a joke and that’s how I’m going to take it. I need to stop feeding this ridiculous fantasy, he’s too old for me, anyway.

“I’m glad I got to see you before I leave Dr. Stevenson, keep Poppy safe for me?”

“Of course, I won’t let anything happen to her and if I’m lax with the name protocol around you, why not push the boundary a little further,” I arch my brows at him and his smirk lights me up like a 4th of July firework.

“You can call me Cole,” he stands up and I follow him out of the cafeteria. He takes my hands one last time before brushing a kiss against my cheek, I don’t know how to act until he ruffles my hair and just like that, the illusion is shattered.

4

Self Doubts and Selfless Deed

Mom can’t even look at me without bursting into tears, can’t she see that she’s splitting me in two? My heart is breaking and there isn’t a damned thing I can do about it, it’s easier to hide in my room and mope in private.

I pull out the paperwork, two nights and I’m gone. I have an overnight bag packed and sitting by the door, even now my eyes keep drifting down to it and I can’t fight the apprehension that’s filling me. If I get chosen, I won’t be allowed to use a damned thing in there and if I get turned away, then I return a failure. Someone who has been found wanting and lacking. Will their opinions match my own self loathing, stemmed from years of jealousy and feeling as though I’m nothing more than the back up child? I know it isn’t fair but Poppy stole the light from every room and all I could do was try to bask in her afterglow. It wasn’t her fault and I know she never meant to do it, but it happened. Which has done nothing more than feed my own insecurities, what the fuck am I doing?

I pull out the papers and my eyes run over them repeatedly until the words bleed together. Five thousand for every year I last and one hundred grand if I make it for the full three years, unless I make it to the top ten and then everything will change. The money increase is astronomical and although I know I won’t make it that far, a hundred grand will be more than enough. There’ll be trips for the more popular girls which don’t interest me but it’s the future possibilities. Very few people will turn me away if I walk away with an education supplied by the Harkwrights. It rivals anything the other colleges offer, the only difference between the two? I have to sell my soul and more than likely my body to get it. I don’t want to be turned away but at the same time; I don’t want to be selected either, what a fucking tangled web I have woven for myself.

“Luna, can you come down for a moment please,” I scrunch my eyes tightly together and try to gather some composure. Mom’s calling me, this can’t be anything good.

I walk slowly down the stairs taking in the photos that adorn the wall, the one of us fishing on a lake and the horrified look on my face after mom told me I had to touch it. Poppy lounging on a beach, looking out to the ocean without a care in the world. Mom sitting on the bleachers watching Poppy performing her cheer routine, she looks so proud and as usual, I’m the one taking most of the pictures. It wasn’t designed like that, I just rarely did anything that was worth immortalizing within a photo frame. At least that’s my opinion, and no one has ever tried to argue with me about it, apart from mom.

Nope, not going there, I roll my shoulders back as I descend the last step but they're already hunching back over as I walk into the kitchen and see mom sitting at the table with a baby photo clutched within her hand.

“Mom, is everything okay?” It’s a stupid question I know, but what else can I say.

“Come and sit Luna, it’s time we had the talk.”

What little color I may possess leaches out of me, if it was a tangible thing I know it would stain the linoleum floor right about now.

I sit down numbly, wondering why she wants to do this all of a sudden. It’s not a simple conversation like the birds and the bees, our education system covered all of that in the mandatory Sex Ed classes, I hated every minute of it. But I get it, I know that sex is an inevitable experience that most people look forward to experiencing and girls either see their virginity as a gift or a weapon. I don’t have those preconceptions, how can I? Where I’m set to go, it’s nothing more than a transaction. I’ll be selling my v card and probably so many more firsts. First actual kiss - not some awkward high school kiss that was far from enjoyable - first touch, first everything. Just not my first time falling in love, I know that will never happen within those walls.

No this conversation will be harder and a lot more personal, the story of how Donna Carter became my mom.

“Is this really necessary mom, I don’t think I want to know anymore. I already know you adopted me but it changes nothing. You are my mom and Poppy is my sister, that’s the only family I ever need to know.”

“I think this is the only time I really see a fire in your eyes, when it comes to keeping my feelings safe, but this is for you. Baby, if you go to that place then you have the right to know who you are and I won’t keep that from you any more,” I can see the guilt in the lines around her eyes and the shadows within their depths and all I want to do is assuage her of it.

“You’ve never kept it from me, I was the one who didn’t want to know and I still don’t. Please,” I’ll get on my knees right now and beg her if I have to, I don’t want to know anything about the parents I’ve never had and definitely don’t need.

She slides a picture to me and tears prick my eyes, making them sting. I don’t know the woman in the photo but on so many levels I do, the alabaster skin, white hair and ice-blue eyes. I’m her but really, I’m the baby she has grasped to her chest with a smile so full of warmth and happiness gracing her lips.

“If you don’t want to know then I won’t force you to listen, but this is your mother by blood and you can’t argue with that look of love on her face. The day your file fell into my lap was the start of a love only equalled to your sister. It doesn’t matter that me and Poppy share the same blood, I love you both the same and you will always be my little Luna bean,” tears are pooling in her eyes and I want to hold her and offer her c

omfort but I don’t give hugs when I have to initiate it. I’m too awkward to make the first move in anything. “There is one thing I will give you though, and that’s a name, in case you change your mind. Selene Starr, that was your birth mother’s name.”

Starr seriously, so my name should have been Luna Starr, nope I think I’ll stick to Carter. A name can hold a lot of power and there is nothing more powerful than the love I feel for my family.

“Is there anything you want to know about that time Luna? I really am okay talking about it. You must have some questions surely,” why is she so determined to unravel the bones of a past that doesn’t even feel like it’s mine.

“Only one I guess, why me?” She looks at me with her head tilted to the side, I guess she wants me to elaborate. “Why did you choose to take me in over all the other kids that you must have been given to choose from? Surely you could have found a more normal child to be a sister or even a brother to Poppy?” My eyes stare at a hole in the wall. I wonder if I should go to a hardware store tomorrow and get it fixed before I leave, I’m the only one who will do it. mom will just let it be.