Broken Things

He promised me a childhood. He said that if I got good grades and stayed in school he would buy me a high school ring by my 16th birthday. I stared down at him, his face like wax and feeling like frozen chicken. I was 15 and my Dad was dead.

  The funeral was a blur. Everyone cried, hugged, and held on for far too long. I moved from one moment to the next, waiting to get home to Florida. The airport was packed with nervous energy. It was after all two weeks after 9/11. If I'm honest about the whole ordeal I would say that my world felt like it was ending. People in the news were crying over losing loved ones and I somehow felt lucky. At least my Dad had been given a warning. Six months earlier he called me and told me that he wouldn't be around by September. I thought he had been exaggerating.

  Up until that point, my strange teenage life had seemed to finally turn itself around. I had a high school boyfriend and our relationship had lasted a year. You know the kind, where you can't wait to get to school, can't wait to call them once you get home, and everything seems right in the world when they're around. 

  My studies had been going well. I was getting better grades and I was told that if I worked hard I would graduate on time. That's why when everything started to crack. It was like I was on the inside of an egg. People saw it on the outside but I had no idea that my world was about to give way. 

  I got off the plane and the heavy winter coat that was a good idea in Ohio was now a mistake. The second the Florida humidity hit my face, I nearly got sick. My legs burned through my jeans on the vinyl backseats of the cab on the car ride home. My mom greeted me like a stranger and then later told me that I shouldn't cry over such a monster of a man as my father.

  So I began my bottling up process. When anyone asked me how I was I would shrug and lie. At home, with my mom, I'm sure I seemed unaffected, and just the right amount of expected teenage angst. 

 The only place that I was safe was with him. At school in quiet moments, I would let the truth slip out. I would let tears well up in my tired eyes. I would sigh long sighs and I didn't need to pretend to be anything other than what I was; a 15-year-old in mourning.

  The holidays flew by and it felt like the fog was lifting. It was February, my birthday, a week before Valentine's Day. I never put much stock into Valentine's Day. Even at a new 16, I was a bit of a cynic. I figured the day was for much older people and candy and card companies to squeeze money out of lonely people desperate to make connections. 

  My best friend handed me a chocolate heart and my boyfriend made a silly joke. I remember the three of us sitting on the back steps of the school building laughing. Looking back, I think I should have seen the signs. The three of us were always together. He was always trying to lighten the moments and trying to make us laugh. Make us laugh. And we did. She laughed more than I did though. She was still the same, she hadn't changed. She and I had always loved to laugh together, to have fun. Life was hard but we tried to keep things light and silly. She hadn't changed. I had.

  I remember the first gut-wrenching hit I took. I was sitting waiting for school to start and a girl that I never considered a friend approached me. She said that my best friend and boyfriend had started riding to school together. That they were being giggly that morning. I remember the slow death row walk I took as I approached them. Their laughter cut short and their smiles faded. They asked how I was feeling. My insides turned to stone and I felt dead inside. This was no longer two friends being friends. I had interrupted them. 

  Over the next few days, I carried on like business as usual. I kept my distance though. It was in that week that everything came out. It felt like turning on a light in a familiar room. You know what to expect but the light still throws you off guard.  

  I remember him taking my hands and he started crying. He told me he loved me. I told him that I loved him. He said that he had started having feelings for my best friend ever since I came back from the funeral. He said that I wasn't myself anymore. I didn't laugh anymore. I was sad. She was happy. I was too intense for him. I told him that I wished them the best. I meant it. I was done with love.

  That part of my life ended. I dropped out of school and started working while studying to get my G.E.D. With my oldest friends, I shared my sorrow. My good days and bad. I honestly believed at that point that I could escape my teen years without injury from another love gone bad. 

  One day I got a call. My good friend had met some amazing guy who was "insane and interesting and weird", she said. Naturally, she thought of me. I was flattered. Insert eye roll. She hung up on me and three-way called me back. This stranger was on the other line. He started protesting hook-ups, claiming that he was done with romance and love and wanted nothing to do with any of it. I, of course, was intrigued and felt as though maybe I had found an ally against love.

  Before I knew it, I was on a blind date. I had never experienced something so awkward in my entire life. Both of our mutual friends had conspired against us to set it up. I suppose we had no say in the matter.

  We sat outside of a little run down bar waiting for a cheap punk show to start. I remember the weather being perfect and I nervously pulled up weeds from the crack in the sidewalk. We talked about everything and nothing. We talked about God, sex, the universe, and favorite bands. When I talked about death, he didn't pull away. He leaned in closer, asking me questions and never tried to change the subject. 

  Later, he told me that he loved me and I believed him. Instantly, I had terrifying feelings for him. He was a game-changer, he would ruin my plans of being an island. I terrified him as well. I was going to be the person that shook everything up. I never realized that having my heart broken would allow another person to break into it. Claim the space as their own and change my entire life.

  My broken heart inhabitant has been my husband for 14 years. We have 4 amazing children now and their little spirits have gotten into this ticker too. Hearts are funny little things. They take a lot of abuse sometimes. They break, they heal, they shrink. In my case, mine healed and grows bigger every day. 

I guess what I learned from having a broken heart was that no matter the damage, no matter how many times it all falls apart and needs to be repaired, never forsake it. A broken heart can still beat. It can still call out to other broken hearts and help another heal. Even when someone sees no value in your brokenness, take heart. You are loved, and you will continue to love.