Piece by Piece

Five

~~ FIVE

Nick didn't come back after that night. My sixteenth and seventeenth birthdays passed with me alone on my swing, feeling just as lost and confused as I had when Dad had left.     

I couldn't really bring myself to care about much those few years. Even when Mam was getting better and becoming more like the mother I'd always wished for her to be, I wasn't happy or hopeful, didn't forgive her for all those years I'd spent hurting and alone when I'd needed her the most. I just couldn't bring myself to do it.

Not becoming hopeful was a good thing, though, as I knew I wouldn't have been able to cope with her leaving me again, which quickly happened when her boyfriend broke up with her. I was left feeling as empty as the bottles that lay strewn around the house; just as broken as the glasses she shattered when she spiralled yet again, tearing apart the tiny connection I'd felt with her in an instant.

It seems, the more you open your heart, the more you hurt.

I didn't want to hurt anymore. I'd had too much of that in the time that had passed since Nick had given me my flower, whose petals I had torn off in anger with every passing day I'd spent waiting for him to return, but he never did.

It didn't take long for the thirty-four petals to dwindle to none. 

I spent thirty-four heartbreakingly empty nights alone on my swing, waiting into the early hours of the following mornings — having just the smallest flicker of irrepressible hope that he'd come back to see me, if only for a moment.

It took until all the petals were gone before I realised that he, like my dad, was gone without a word and not coming back.

It was that year I realised that hope just leads to heartbreak, and I couldn't take much more of it. I missed Nick almost as much as I missed my father, but at least I knew where Dad had gone, though the little child within me still sometimes didn't believe her mother's words.

He's not gone, I remember thinking on the morning of my eighth birthday when I'd awoken to silence, he's just not here.

Mam wouldn't leave the house on the morning of his tenth anniversary. She'd been boyfriend-less at the time, always in a drunken state of oblivion and unable to get up off the living room floor. I didn't try to persuade her to go. She hadn't gone to his one-year anniversary when I'd needed her the most; another year alone made little difference.

Like every other time, I'd felt empty at the mass, but I expected nothing less: it was just another reminder of how long it'd been since I'd last seen his smile and that, no matter how long would pass, I'd never stop missing him.

You don't ever really get over losing someone; you just learn to live without them. 

I didn't listen to a word that was being said during the mass - 'in one ear and out the other', as Dad would've said. The only thing I could think about was how he was taken from me in the place where I was meant to be safe. The two people I loved most were gone, and I was once again left alone after the mass was over. I may have been used to the feeling, but it didn't hurt any less.

The few others who'd attended the service went to the graveyard to pay their respects, but I wanted to be with Dad on my own, so I went to our place. I just wanted to be close to him again, wanted to remember the sound of his laughter and to forget how hard it'd been to grow up without him when I'd always thought he'd be there, no matter what.

Without him behind me, I felt no reason to swing high, so I just swung slightly on Nick's swing.

Only, it wasn't really his swing anymore. In the years that'd passed, the chain had been replaced, now painted black and rust-free. It no longer squeaked whenever it swung; no longer told me its name was Nick or moved in sync with mine — because it was gone. 

He was gone. 

They both were, and sitting on the bit of plastic where he once had sat wasn't enough to change the fact that every time I returned home, I felt like another piece of my heart had left me.

But that was impossible.

Nick had already taken it all.

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Nóta: I wish I didn't have to say this, but this story is ONLY available on Whattpadd (purposely misspelled), NOT NovelHD or any other website. If you are reading this story on anywhere but WP, PLEASE stop; it has been plagiarised, and there's nothing I can do to get it removed. There's a petition going around to get NovelHD shut down, but until then, please stay away from the site and support writers on the sites where they actually gave their permission to share their works. Thank you :)