A Shattered Heart (Fractured Lives 2)

Without a word he herded me toward the bathroom. I passed the girl from earlier who shot me a sympathetic look on her way out of the bathroom. She assumed the ride had made me sick too. I nodded at her, latching on to the excuse. I stepped in front of the mirror by the sink, cool air conditioning washed over my pale face. The memory clung to me as I gripped the edge of one of the sinks with my sweaty palms. This one had been a rough one. Usually the nightmares spared me during my waking hours, only haunting me in my bed, where I could recover from them. Thankfully the bathroom was empty. No one was there to witness me as I sagged against the porcelain of the sink. I rested my forehead against it, waiting for the last of the memories to leave my system. After a few minutes I forced myself to release my death grip on the sink. I turned on the faucet, cupping cold water into my hands and splashing it on my face. My pale reflection made me grimace. Two years of this shit. I should be over it. Zach was right. I was seriously fucked up.

***

"I need you to stop the damn memories," I announced the next day, slamming the door of Dr. Carlton's office behind me as I barged into his office for my weekly session.

"Let me pull out my magic wand," he said dryly, settling behind his desk.

I gritted my teeth at his patronizing tone. "I'm serious. I've moved on. The memories need to leave me alone."

He tapped his pen on his desk. "I realize that. Unfortunately, short of channeling magical powers, there's no magic pill that's going to help you. You can start taking the sleeping pills I prescribed a year ago," he pointed out.

I growled my displeasure. He was like a damn broken record. Sleeping pills did me little good when the memories wouldn't let me be even during the day.

His chair creaked loudly as he settled back in his seat. He folded his perfectly groomed hands atop his desk. His hands were smooth as a baby's ass and blemish free, just like everything else about him. Carlton was the very essence of metrosexual. It was clear he got his hair cut regularly and spent hours being buffed and shined. At times he looked lifeless, like one of the sculptures at the wax museum. Too perfect to be real.

"Why don't you tell me what happened?" he said, sitting forward.

"What do you think happened? It was the same shit as always. I'm minding my own business and, bam, Jessica's screams are filling my ears once again."

He made a humming noise in the back of his throat and I debated stabbing him in the throat with his pen. I hated that sound. It was his judgmental noise. He blamed me for the memories. As shrinks went, he totally sucked at the non-judging oath they're supposed to take. I'd told him as much the last time I was here.

The humming continued and I debated jumping out his window to escape it. Maybe if we were higher than the second floor I would have. I could play his game. I knew what the humming meant. He was wrong and maybe if I shoved my fist down his throat and pulled out his windpipe he wouldn't be able to hum his disapproval. He'd be forced to whistle it out through a tube in his throat. The minutes ticked by. Money circled the drain before disappearing from sight. I would have walked away months ago, but it was Mom and Dad's only stipulation. They'd let me live in my dangerous neighborhood, avoid my old life, and be the person I now was, but in return I had to go to therapy every single week. Leaving Dr. Carlton and finding a new shrink to mess with my head would have been the easiest choice, but one thing held me back and he knew that. If I switched shrinks I would be forced to discuss the accident and the losses all over again. I would be shackled to Carlton for eternity by sheer stubbornness.

"Seeing Mackenzie isn't going to suddenly cure me," I finally yelled at him so his damn humming would stop. "For your information, I saw her and it didn't help in the slightest."

"Yes, you saw her but you neglected to talk to her. You're angry at her."

"Hell yes, I'm angry. She's moved on without a backward glance at any of us."

He clucked his tongue, twirling his pen around on his desk with the tip of his finger. "I thought you said you've moved on also," he said, throwing my words back in my face.

I glared at him. "It's not the same thing," I railed.

"You're right, it's not. Mackenzie has truly moved on. You are still stuck in the past. Until you face all your ghosts, moving on will remain what it really is, an illusion. You have to talk about the accident. You have to forgive your friends." His eyes bore into mine. "You have to forgive Dan for leaving you."

Like a rocket I was up and out of my chair and out of his office. His door slammed behind me.

"See you next week, Kat," Ms. Nielsen, his receptionist, called out to me as I stalked out the front door. She was unfazed by the slamming of his door. Almost every single one of our sessions ended this way.

My anger propelled me across the parking lot, following me in my car as I pulled out and tore down the road. He was a fool. I was not angry at Dan for leaving me. I was angry at myself for letting him go. I didn't need to face the past to accept this. The memories were so bad lately because of my recent run-ins, plain and simple. I needed to distance myself from everyone who was pulling those memories to the surface.

Nine

For the next month I did exactly that. I kept my run-ins with Brian to a bare minimum and declined any invitations to hang out. I stayed away from any parks near my parents' house and threw myself into work and my own artwork. When I wasn't painting or teaching I was running in the literal sense of the word. I took up evening running, pushing myself to a near breaking point so I would fall into bed exhausted every night. It didn't stop the nightmares completely, but it did prevent them from tormenting me every single night.

By July, I felt more in control and managed to make it through several sessions with Carlton without leaving his office in a fit of rage each time. I fooled myself into believing I was happier this way. The problem was I knew I was lying. The separation that I'd deemed necessary for so long no longer worked. Thoughts of my friends dogged my footsteps every second of the day. I began to believe they were numbing me from the outside in since the knives of pain were now a dull ache instead of the piercing sharpness I was used to. It was a losing battle.

That's why I found myself driving into my old neighborhood on a hot July day dripping with humidity. Gripping my steering wheel with sweaty palms, I had no idea what my plan was. I was testing the waters of painful memories. If they threatened to drown me, I'd drive away like a bat out of hell. My foot hovered over the gas pedal as I approached Jessica's house. I started to press down on the pedal when I saw someone working in the yard. It only took my brain a moment to compute the necessary information that the person in the yard wasn't either of Jessica's parents. Instead of tapping the gas, my foot tapped the brake, bringing my car to a crawl as I craned my neck trying to get a better look at the woman who didn't look much older than me. A toddler sat at her feet plucking pieces of grass. I didn't recognize either of them.

With my heart in my throat I finally lifted my foot from the brake and continued down the road. Jessica's parents had sold their house. No one told me. That wasn't a surprise. I'd made the subject taboo. It was clear that everyone else had moved on. They were right—I was the only one who was stuck in the past.

Without giving it too much thought, I turned abruptly down the next street. The houses passed by my window, but I didn't bother looking at any of them. I had one destination in mind. My car drove to it like a homing device had been installed beneath its hood.

I pulled into the driveway we used to play basketball on for endless hours after school. The hoops were still positioned on either side, though none of us would ever play on it again.

I walked by them, shutting the memories down.

Reaching the front door, my fist froze midair. It was less than an inch from the door with its etched privacy window. The sudden will to be here had left me as soon as I pulled my car into