Broken, not Shattered

Pain

T/W: Suicide and child abuse (physical and sexual) mentioned in chapter...

~I'm forced to fake

A smile, a laugh every day of my life

My heart can't possibly break

When it wasn't even whole to start with~

~Kelly Clarkson~

Pain. Pain was a funny thing. Your body uses the sensation of physical pain to let you know something is hurting you. Physical pain at least is helpful, warning you to remove yourself from what ever is causing you to feel the pain. You touch a hot stove, the pain makes you jerk your hand back to save you. Absolutely helpful. Emotional pain, well that seems pretty pointless. Why would your body make you feel pain when feelings are hurt? Especially when you are unable to leave the situation causing the emotional agony.

Sophie was no stranger to pain of both kinds. She had been subjected to physical pain from as far back as she could really remember. That doesn't mean she doesn't have good memories, as well. She had a few perfect memories of her dad, before he killed himself. How he would pick her up and let her ride on his shoulders the entire way to the park. They laughed often. He took her to the park a lot, especially when her mother was upset. The park was their safe place.

It was emotional pain she felt first. That gut wrenching pain that blanks out your entire brain. The kind that leaves you an empty shell of who you used to be. The kind that taints all future happiness. She felt it so profoundly, it eased the physical pain into her life, making it feel almost like relief. The start of the emotional pain happened during first grade, she had come home from an autumn afternoon, expecting him to meet her at the bus stop like every other day.

He hadn't been there. She was angry that she had to walk the few blocks home by herself. She remembers stepping into their house and instantly knowing something was off inside. The smell was wrong, she could remember the wall, it was a mess. The first thought was how her mom was going to be so mad. The wall looked like someone had flung thick strawberry preserves at it. Thicker globs had run down the wall and onto the floor. The smell, though, the smell was definitely not strawberries. The air smelled tangy. It tickled her nose.

She stepped further in, moving into the small living room, towards the chair next to the messy wall. Her body froze, her eyes refusing to blink. They locked on her daddy, slouched in the chair, head tilted to the side. His eyes were open, staring ahead at nothing. The thick tangles of blood coated his hair, having dripped onto the arm of the chair. She could tell his head was not shaped right. She couldn't take her eyes away from any of it.

That was how her mother had found her, hours later. Sophie hadn't cried, her eyes were so dry, she wasn't sure if she had even blinked much. The image was burned into her brain either way. At six years old, she didn't understand the words people were throwing around; suicide and depression. These didn't mean anything. She was just sad that he had left her. Emotional pain she couldn't escape.

The overwhelming sadness filled her as they lowered the casket into the ground. There weren't many people there at the funeral. Her mom, the pastor from the church, a few of her dad's friends, and herself. She still didn't cry. She felt like she had no tears inside. Once she went home that evening, the tears finally came, letting that full feeling in her chest leave, leaving just a hallow space instead. The pain was still fresh when they moved out of the house and into a small apartment just the two of them. All of her dad's things were gone, the memories, his clothes. Her mom had even packed away his pictures. She had effectively erased him from their lives. By the time Christmas had come that year, her mom had brought home a new friend, Chuck.