Page 42 of Broken Pieces
“She’s been looking for you,” he says.
Of course she fucking has. She always is.
The words settle like a weight across my shoulders.
I nod at the kid, not saying a word, and start down the hall, keeping my steps light, careful, hoping I can reach my room without her catching me. My room is the only place I can breathe, even if the air inside feels as poisoned as the rest of this house.
But I am not that lucky. I never am.
Her voice slices through the air the moment I’m about to make my escape.
“You got something to tell me?”
I freeze.
One foot in the hall, one foot out.
“No.”
“So nothing?” she prompts again, sharper now. “You just stroll in here, head held high, like the school didn’t call me earlier to tell me you cracked some kid’s nose?”
My shoulders go rigid.
I turn to face her because pretending I didn’t hear her will only make it worse.
She stands there in the doorway, hands on her hips, curlers still in her hair. A bathrobe hangs half-open, sagging off her body, the sight of it making bile crawl up the back of my throat.
Her tits spill out through the lace she probably thinks makes her look like one of those heroines in the steamy romance novels she devours. The whole picture makes me want to set the house on fire just to erase it.
“You think I’m made of time, Zane?” she snaps, voice climbing with every word. “You think I enjoy getting calls from the school? Do you like embarrassing me?”
I say nothing.
Because there is no winning here. There never is.
Her sigh is long, theatrical, a hand pressed to her chest as if I just wounded her with my silence alone.
“I told them you were trying. Told them you’d been better lately. That you were calming down. And then this.”
“Well, I didn’t ask you to.” My voice is low, but it lands like gasoline.
Her eyes narrow, her mouth pulling into that bitter twist I know too well.
“I should have known,” she mutters, shaking her head, each word sharp enough to cut. “You’re just another screw-up no one can fix.”
My nails dig deep into the fabric lining my pocket. Rage curls hot in my gut, boiling up into my throat.
I want to scream.
I want to slam my fist into the wall until the plaster cracks and my knuckles split more. To prove I am not the fuck-up she says I am, but the only proof I have is history, and history says she is right.
I clamp my teeth together until my jaw throbs. Because yelling won’t change shit. Exploding won’t fix it. All it will do is prove her point.
“I don’t know how much more I can take of yo-”
A crash of footsteps cuts through her rant.
A couple of kids bolt through the hall, nearly colliding with her. One of them freezes when she snaps her gaze on him, a box of cereal clutched tight against his chest.
