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I look up at each of them, seeing the sincerity in their eyes. I don’t want to tell anyone my secrets, but I feel like I need to tellsomeone. I should tell them, since they seem to be my only friends here.
I shrug out of Blaire’s hold, pressing my hands against the cushion beneath me and sitting on the edge of my seat. My fingers reach up, and I curl them around the top button on the collar of my shirt. I push the plastic through the hole, the front of my shirt loosening and opening. The girls are silent as they wait for my response, watching tentatively as I continue to undo button after button. Once I have enough room, I shove my shirt aside, revealing my black bra. Pulling the cups down slightly, I keep myself concealed but give them a glimpse of my biggest secret, biggest regret, worst nightmare, all rolled in one.
"Holy shit. What happened to you?" Blaire gasps, her hand reaching up to brush my skin. At the last moment, though, her fingers freeze, and she pulls her hand back, settling it back down into her lap.
I bring a hand up and press between my breasts, the large, ugly scar that runs from the top of my sternum to below my breasts. It's long, ugly, discolored, and the texture feels like burnt skin.
"I think… I think that was my dad," I say absentmindedly. "I think that was him through the Ouija board." I glance down at it, the wooden planchette still poised over the letter D.
"What happened?" Piper asks.
I blink, feeling like too much is happening too quickly. I want to grab the board and ask it more questions. See if it is my daddy talking to me. But I also want to run. I want to run from this town and never look back.
I look at each of them, their wide eyes, their pale faces all expectant and curious. They want to know, but the real question is, do I tell them? Do I trust them with a piece of myself that I've kept bottled up inside me for the past two years?
Sacha and Leena know at home, but even they didn't know about my deepest, darkest horrors and the feelings that drip through my body with blood as cold as ice.
"I have… or, well, had a heart condition. I was born with it, really. We all thought we had it under control. I took my medications, went to the doctor appointments, ate healthy. I did everything right, and my family thought I was fine."
"What happened?" Piper asks, stepping around the table and sitting next to me on the couch, opposite of Blaire.
I breathe, and for the first time since my surgery, it feels like my heart is in pain. I bring my hand up, rubbing it against my breast, attempting to lessen the ache. It doesn't do anything, though. If anything, the ache continues to grow with each passing moment.
"My dad and I were driving home one night, and it was raining super hard. He could barely see out of the windshield. The rain sounded like hail, like softball-sized hail pounding at the roof of the car as hard as it could. He was going to pull over because he couldn't see a thing. But before he could, he hit a road with standing water, and he hydroplaned." I swallow, my throat feeling dry, each inch of my mouth sticky and thick. "We went over the curb, straight down a hill and into a pond."
I look up at them, seeing their horrified faces of my tragic life. The nightmare that I relived while I was in a coma. The never-ending dream that I couldn't escape from. It played in my mind. For minutes, hours, days, weeks… I don't remember how many times I heard my dad scream in my ears until I woke up in the hospital room. "I blacked out. I don't remember what happened, not exactly. All I do remember is that I woke up, with a huge scar between my breasts and my dad's heart placed in my chest. The crash fucked him up pretty bad, and he was brain dead for a short while, but they knew he’d never get out of it. It was unnecessary to even leave him on life support because he would’ve been a vegetable forever. There was nowhat-ifor anything like that. He was just a dead body. But me, I survived, I guess, even though I wish I hadn't." I rub my chest again, my dad's heart beating beneath my ribs. The steady, heavy rhythm thumping blood through my veins.
"I don't want his heart inside me. I don't want the reminder that he died, and I survived. It could have—should have—been me. I was the one with the broken body. My dad would have lived longer than everyone else. Except he didn't."
“So, what, your heart failed?” Hazel asks, scooching closer to me. Tears glisten in her eyes, her heavy black makeup smearing slightly.
I nod. “The problem that we all thought was under control was a roaring nightmare. My heart was halfway dead by the time I got into the car accident. I wouldn’t have made it another year with my own pathetic heart in my chest. Unfortunately, or fortunately, as my mom says, my dad and I were a match. It took nothing, the doctors say. From one chest to another, our hospital beds only inches from each other. My dad lost a heart, and I gained his.” I feel sick just thinking about it. Thinking about my lifeless father losing a part of himself when he never should have had to.
He was never supposed to die.
Blaire wipes her eyes, and Piper sniffles. Hazel looks lost, slightly depressed as heavy bags form beneath her eyes.
"I don't want anyone's pity. So don't look at me like that." I wipe my hand down my face, halfway wishing I didn't tell them in the first place so I wouldn't have to feel like I'm feeling now. But, at the end of the day, am I ever not feeling like this? Is there ever a time when I feel actually… content?
I don't think so.
"I think I'm going to head home." I stand up, buttoning my shirt.
"Are you sure? You can stay here, if you want," Blaire says softly, standing up beside me. Piper and Hazel follow suit, standing silently but watching me so, so damn loudly.
I think of what would happen if I stayed the night. How angry my mother would get if I didn't tell her where I was. If I worried her even slightly, she would freak out on me.
Then, there's Malik.
Malik, Malik, Malik.
He's a force. Something so much larger than anyone I've ever met. He's everything evil wrapped up into a hugely destructive man. Rock-hard, dark hair, dark eyes, creamy skin. He could be on the cover of a magazine. He should be. Hottest man of the year, or whatever. He's classically handsome, although there's a ruggedness, a piece of him that seems so unnatural. Like his nose has been broken a few times, or he's been built with scars. They may be invisible, but they make his imperfections all that more prominent.
He's controlling, too. And I have a feeling he's waiting for me, staring from the dark, dusted windows of his house, just waiting for the moment I step through the doors. Only so he can terrorize me. I seem to be his new toy in that regard.
I shake my head. "I better go home. I don't have service here." I look up at Hazel. "I don't have service anywhere in this town. Do you?"
She shakes her head. "There is a special phone provider for this town. If you look around outside, there are no cell phone towers. No towers at all, actually. This town is secluded from the rest of the world."
