Title: Shards of Glass
Author: VietAngel
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: I don't own these charaters and I make no profit from them.
Sam brushed the damp strands of hair from her face as she padded down the unfamiliar hallway. Normally a nice hot bubble bath as soon as she got home would have relaxed her and eased the tensions of the day…but not this time. This time nothing was helping to relieve the raging headache she was currently suffering from…not the bath, not the ibuprofen she was sure she had taken too much of, and certainly not this house. As she opened the door to the bedroom she was to occupy from now on, it suddenly hit her like a ton of bricks…this wasn't her home, this wasn't her sanctuary. This room…it was dark, industrial, sterile, and cold. She shivered and longed for her real room and her real home…the one with the warm, bright orange walls that she and her parents had painted together on her 13th birthday. The thought made her smile fleetingly. She sighed as she stepped into the room and kicked the door closed behind her.
She began the daunting task of searching through the mountain of boxes that occupied the space to find something comfortable to wear. It took her a full twenty minutes to find socks, panties, a baby tee, and a comfy pair of fleece pajama pants…a task that would have taken her no more than five minutes had she been in her home, where she belonged. She slipped into the ensemble, but as a chill coursed through her body she felt like there was something missing. It didn't take long for it to come to her, and she was thankful that the missing item was among the few things she had unpacked that were now strewn across the bed. Her father's robe. It nearly swallowed her tiny frame whole, but she didn't care. She put it on and tightened the belt around herself as best she could. It made her feel small and warm…it was the closest she could get to being in his arms again.
She inhaled hoping to catch a trace of his cologne still lingering on it, but there was nothing. She'd never washed it, not since that night after his funeral when her mother had covered her with it as she slept in his favorite chair…but two years was a long time. It seemed like forever to her. There was no trace of him left on it now. Thinking about him seemed to make her already pounding head hurt more so she decided to lie down. It had been a rather uneventful day, yet she still felt exhausted. She cleared the items from her bed and placed them on top of a stack of boxes. Though there was nothing strenuous about the activity, she found that she didn't even have the energy to pull back the covers when she was finished, so she just sprawled out on top of the covers…not even bothering to kick off her fuzzy slippers.
Looking over to the night table to her right she saw that the clock read 5:15 p.m. It wasn't even dinnertime yet but she felt like a kid who had been up way past her bedtime. The fact that she hadn't eaten since lunch crossed her mind in brief, but she quickly came to the conclusion that sleep was more appealing to her than food at the moment. The clock wasn't the only thing on the night table that caught her eye. She clumsily reached over, knocking her bottle of ibuprofen on its side, and picked up a picture frame.
Joe McPherson, her father, the best dad ever…a man she would never lay eyes on again in this lifetime. Tears stung her eyes as she ran a trembling hand over the picture. It was still hard to believe that he was gone. Her heart still ached for him…now more than ever. As the tears began to flow freely down her face she couldn't feel anything except anger. She was angry that he was gone, angry that her mother had fallen in love with her arch rival's father, angry that she had been stripped of her home, her comfort zone, her happiness…all because he was gone.
Everything hurt, it all hurt so much. This was Brooke McQueen's house, Brooke McQueen's life…she didn't belong and she didn't want to. All she wanted was her life back. She wanted to be curled up in her nice warm bed, in her house that actually felt like a home, with the sound of her parents' laughter wafting through the air. The one thing she wanted most of all was the one thing she couldn't have…her dad. He was the one who always knew how to make everything okay. No matter what was going on in her life, no matter how bad she was feeling, he always found a way to make it better. This time he was what was broken. Her life had unexpectedly shattered into a million shards of glass and there wasn't enough superglue in the world to fix it. Daddy wasn't around to pick up the pieces anymore.
She hugged the frame to her chest and the emotions coursing through her began to become overwhelming. The ache in her head and the ache in her heart were too much to bear. She sloppily placed the picture back onto the night table face down and mustered enough strength to roll over onto her stomach.
She closed her eyes and tried to remember the way things used to be. When he was still alive he would be sit with her when she wasn't feeling well, stroking her hair and talking quietly with her until she fell asleep. She tried as hard as she could to reach into the farthest corners of her mind to conjure up the feel of his hands in her hair, but the memories weren't as sharp anymore. She inhaled sharply; her greatest fear was becoming reality. She was starting to forget him. The thought of not remembering him one day made her stomach roll and her head spin.
She wondered how long the pain would last. Would the dull ache in her chest ever fade? She didn't know how she could go on like this. She wanted her mother to be happy, but this was all happening faster than she could process it. She was afraid that she'd never adjust and be condemned to a miserable existence until she could leave for college.
"Why daddy? Why did you have to die?" she choked out as she clutched a pillow and began to sob uncontrollably into it.
Hot tears soaked into the fabric and quickly cooled. She cried and cried until she just couldn't cry anymore. Her sobs subsided into hiccups, her swollen eyelids drooped, and her body went limp…all the energy zapped away. She was uncomfortable and in unfamiliar surroundings, but she was too drained to grapple with it anymore. Finally, she stopped fighting and drifted off into a fitful sleep.
TBC…
