Flawless//Broken

  Contents

  PART ONE ONE

  PART TWO TWO

  PART THREE THREE

  PART FOUR FOUR

  PART FIVE FIVE

  PART SIX SIX

  PART SEVEN SEVEN

  PART EIGHT EIGHT

  PART NINE NINE

  PART TEN TEN

  PART ELEVEN ELEVEN

  PART TWELVE TWELVE

  PART THIRTEEN THIRTEEN

  PART FOURTEEN FOURTEEN

  PART ONE

  ONE

  Chapter 1

  FLAWLESS//BROKEN

  A novel by Sara Wolf

  Book One of the All Things Sullied And Pure Series

  “Screw them,” I snap. “They don’t know anything about anything. Do what makes you happy.”

  Darius whirls me around, then pulls me back to him, pinning my chest tight against his. We’re so close I can see the streaks of copper - exactly the color of prima materia - in his golden eyes. He leans in, his lips inches away from touching mine and our gazes locked. I can’t think, or move. In the chandelier light he’s so undeniably handsome and close I can barely breathe. The music fades, the people fade, the only thing left his aching expression and the hardness of his body against mine.

  He leans further in, to my ear.

  “I can never do what makes me happy,” He murmurs.

  “Wh-Why not?”

  I feel his fingers tighten on my hips oh-so-slightly, and suppress the shiver that runs through me.

  “Because it would get people hurt.”

  Sara Wolf

  Flawless//Broken

  Copyright ©2015 by Sara Wolf

  All rights reserved. This work or any portion thereof may not be utilized or reproduced in any way, with exception of review purposes, without the written consent of the author.

  This is a work of fiction. Any resemblances to real persons, events, names, or locations are coincidental and a product of the author’s imagination.

  For questions, concerns, or comments, please contact the author at [email protected]

  ONE

  If there’s one thing I hate more than moving, it’s moving.

  Luckily for me, I've done it twice this year.

  "Mia!" My roommate Ellie shouts from the other room. "Stop murdering that box!"

  I stab the taped-up cardboard box that holds my winter four more times for good measure with the kitchen knife. I'd use scissors, except then it wouldn’t satiate my infinite lust for mindless, pointy destruction.

  "I can't. Call 911." I shout back, my voice echoing in the empty, wood-floored room. Sunlight streams in, fresh and clear through the single window. Outside of it a quaint San Francisco hill looms - steep, blanketed in fog, and hedged with cute, gingerbread-like houses in all colors of the rainbow. And beyond that is the beautiful bay, the waters steel gray.

  It's a miracle two college Sophomores scored someplace this nice. Ellie has a good lease track record, but mine is, to put it nicely, shitty. I’d only ever lived with Dad in a trailer park, and that didn’t exactly fly well with people looking to rent. For a long while, it seemed like we'd never find a place, but a miracle came in the form of a little old grandma who took pity on us. The place smells like cats, but it’s cheap and close to the farmer's market and the toilet isn't falling off the wall, and in the sunlight the wood floors are beautiful, so we call it a win.

  It’s even more of a miracle anyone from my tiny farming hometown in Idaho wanted to move to California with me, despite my reputation. Despite my scars.

  I touch the one on my face, just below my jaw. It’s jagged and still a little raw – I took the bandage off on the car ride here. The doctors said it would heal, but it would take time, and I laughed and said ‘it’s permanent, isn’t it?’. And they nodded.

  I glance up at the long mirror hanging on my door. Permanent.

  No. This is a fresh start. The freshest start, nearly two thousand miles away from what I'd done.

  "Ahem," Ellie’s suddenly in my doorway, flaming red hair pulled back with a bandanna and her overalls spattered with paint. "I thought I'd inform you the bathroom is now extremely pink."

  I groan. "Oh god, anything but pink."

  "Bright, hot pink!" She asserts cheerfully. "Now leave that poor box alone and put on something decent."

  "Are we having guests?" I stand, wiping my hands on my jeans. "If it's not a british boyband member, I don't care."

  Ellie rolls her bright green eyes. Back in Barton, with her long tan legs and fox-eyes, she was undoubtedly the prettiest girl. Guys used to come from high schools miles away to watch her volleyball practices and games. She went through cosmetology school and learned the ins and outs of makeup, and that only made her prettier. And now that she’s going to San Fransisco University for law, she’ll get even smarter. San Francisco’s about to be taken by storm of blue-balls.

  "We are, obviously, going to have a night out,” Ellie says. “This is our first night ever here and we should start it off with a bang, don't you think?"

  "Remind me again what your idea of fun is?"

  "Getting drunk around a bunch of overdressed people."

  "See, that is also my definition of fun, except for the 'around any sort of living person' bit."

  "Mia, I love you, but you need to suck it up. Puh-lease? Just this once. I'll never have a better excuse to drag you to a club ever again!"

  She shoots me her gorgeous puppy dog eyes of death. I’d much rather stay in and drink cocoa and watch bad Netflix. But Ellie’s done me a huge favor. She’s taken a chance on me when no one else in this world would. My sigh is hard enough to start a hurricane halfway around the world.

  "Alright, fine."

  Ellie squeals like she's ten, then bounces out of my room. Her enthusiasm is practically contagious. She comes back a second later, her expression more somber.

  “And don’t…don’t worry about your face, okay? I’ll do your makeup.”

  She means my scar. It’ll take an entire counter of Maybelline to cover it, and even then she probably won’t be able to hide it all. But it’s the sweet thought that counts. I smile.

  “Thanks, El.”

  She retreats down the hall. I stab the box one last time, tearing it open and rummaging around in it. I find what I'm looking for almost instantly - a black dress with sequins on it. A dress I never thought I'd have the chance to wear. A dress I don't really want to wear. Mom got it for me, the first - and last - time she visited me in my freshmen year of high school before she disappeared off the face of the planet again with a new husband.

  I stand in front of the mirror and hold the dress against my body. My hair is pitch-black and long. Unlike Ellie, I don’t have thick curves or rich amber skin. I blow my limp bangs out of my iron-gray eyes, my freckles obvious against my exhausted complexion. Moving takes a lot out of me. Everything takes a lot out of me, these days. The scar is a reminder I don’t need, a furious voice echoing in my head every time I see it or feel my hair glance against it.

  ‘You bitch! You think you’re just gonna up and leave me like your whore mother?’

  It was easier in high school, when I didn’t argue with him. It was easier when I was miles away in Seattle for college. But it caught up with me – the drinking, the cheap and plentiful pills. Drowning my past out was easier than working through it with homework and a part-time job. So I drowned, deep and long and silent, until the university kicked me out, back to Dad’s. Back to the whiskey. Back to the yelling and arguing. Back to the muddy, misty trailer park and the miles of cornfields and beer-guzzling, gossipy neighbors. I sunk, hard.

  And no one pulled me out. No one gave me CPR. They left me to sink deeper.

  I raise my chin and pull my shirt and shorts off. The dress is tight
on my skin, but I look different in it. I look like a witch queen dressed in sparkling night. I look…powerful. I look like someone not-me.

  And I’d do anything to be not-me.

  ***

  I had this plan.

  And it was incredible.

  It started out with me definitely not failing college and going back home. And then Dad definitely not getting mad at me. And then me definitely not getting shifty looks at the grocery store and post office where everyone knew my first, last, and middle name and had seen me shit my diapers, learn to read, and grow breasts. Not all at once. Because that’s not how growing up works. Thankfully.

  Anyway, the point is at the tender age of six, when I concocted this master plan of success and world fame and fortune, I had no idea what life had in store for me. Life didn’t seem to have any idea what it had in store for me either. It just sort of threw shit at the wall and offered me whatever stuck, and because I was trapped in a tiny Idaho town doing community college and working the night shift at Dan’s Hardware Hell, I took it.

  Until one night, nearly two months ago, when it all changed.

  When I got the scar.

  “There,” Ellie declares, turning me around on my makeshift salon chair – a pile of still-sealed boxes labeled KITCHEN. “You can’t even notice – I mean, you look great!”

  She holds up a hand mirror for me to see my reflection. She’s drawn perfectly symmetrical liner around my eyes, with smokey shadow that looks like it belongs on someone else, someone sexier and living closer to Hollywood. My lips are tinted dark red, a vibrant dark red that almost, almost, takes away the attention from the warped line of skin below my jaw. She couldn’t hide it, the dark purple tissue showing through the foundation.

  “I like the distraction tactic,” I motion to my lips. Ellie looks embarrassed through her own flawless makeup and sapphire velvet backless dress.

  “I thought it’d help,” She whispers.

  “Nothing’s gonna help, El,” I sigh. “Except extensive plastic surgery and slash or making a contract with the devil.”

  “You look like you already have,” she smirks, motioning to my dark dress. I can’t help my smile as I grab my purse with one hand and her manicured hand with the other.

  “You know I’m the evil one, between the two of us.”

  Ellie’s expression flashes with pain - pain she shouldn’t be feeling. Pain she wouldn’t have to feel, if she wasn’t my friend. She’s successful and beautiful and deserves better than a moody, drop-out, minimum-wage failure like me. I laugh it off, because that’s the only thing that’ll make it better.

  “C’mon, let’s go. I’m starving.”

  On our way here in the U-Haul, we stopped at a mom and pop diner with a fifties retro feel near the house, and that’s where we go to eat again. It’s Ellie-policy never to go out clubbing without eating something first, and I’d adopted the incredibly smart habit. The frizzy-haired, rosy-cheeked waitress with a nametag that reads RUBY shoots a huge smile our way. She gives off a distinct mom-vibe, the kind that makes the hole in my chest where my Mom should be ache.

  “Well well, if it isn’t the two beautiful girls from this morning. Liked our pancakes that much, didja?”

  “Let’s not kid ourselves,” I smile. “We came back for your hospitality.”

  “Oooh, you terrible flatterer,” Ruby wags her finger good-naturedly at me, eyes lingering for a bare second on my scar, but she has the kindness to look away quickly. There’s no way she really thinks I’m beautiful like Ellie. I can’t be. Not anymore.

  “This way, ladies. I’ve got a booth for two with a view.”

  I follow Ruby as she leads us to a red-vinyl booth and plops two menus in front of us.

  “So, where are you two off to all gussied up?” She asks. “Night on the town?”

  “We were thinking about clubbing,” Ellie looks up from her menu. “Know any good places?”

  “Oh that sort of thing isn’t for me,” Ruby chuckles. “I like me a square dance more than a dark, smokey little cage fulla handsy men.”

  “Here here,” I bang my fork on the table in agreement. Ellie rolls her eyes. Ruby laughs.

  “Alright, gimme a sec and I’ll be back with your waters.”

  “What?” I try to fend off Ellie’s stare. “I think she’s nice.”

  “It’s not her. It’s the whole club thing. Can you at least try to have fun, Mia? Please? For me?”

  “Me and fun don’t exactly mix,” I put my napkin in my lap. A family across the way is eating, and the little boy is staring at me. At my scar.

  “We both know that’s a lie,” She smirks. “What about the old days, huh? Kids at our high school still talk about that party at Riley’s.”

  “That was three years ago. In dog years that’s like…twenty-eight years. Practically ages. I’ve changed.”

  “Maybe not for the better,” Ellie mumbles.

  “What does that mean?”

  “I’m just worried about you, okay?” She leans in, eyes concerned. “Can I be that? Is that okay?”

  “Yeah, but –”

  “You’ve curled in on yourself, Mia. And I don’t blame you, after…after what happened. But I thought at least here you’d – at least away from your dad you’d, I dunno, loosen up? It’s not like he owns where you’re sleeping anymore, or your car. You’re free.”

  I stare at the menu’s cheery pictures of oil-soaked omelets and sausage. The little kid pulls at his dad’s sleeve and points to me. My scar throbs.

  “I guess - ” I murmur. “ - I guess I have to learn how to be free all over again.”

  Ruby comes with our waters and a smile that breaks our tense quiet. She whips out a notepad.

  “What can I get you girls?”

  I try to smile, and my throat wants to order a new start, a new brain, a new body, a new heart. But I order fries instead.

  PART TWO

  TWO

  Chapter 2

  TWO

  Something is wrong with this club.

  But a lot of things are wrong with most clubs. Coke usually dusts the bathroom sinks. Someone is probably giving a blowjob in a stall, or in a dark corner of the room. People are getting so drunk they can’t see their own idiocy, let alone stop it. Lots of things are wrong with clubs. It’s why I stopped going to them.

  I’m lying. That’s not true.

  I stopped going because with every shot of whiskey I slowly realized I was becoming Dad. My hometown didn’t exactly love me for it. In complete contrast to Ellie, I got suspended at my high school more than I got asked out. I was the quiet girl in freshmen year, the freak. But in sophomore year Ellie dragged me to a party, and I discovered the wondrous evil of booze. It took six months. Six months of shots and too-short shorts, and I was forever known as the party girl. The hard drinker. The girl who didn’t know her limits, but tore past them at seventy-miles-an-hour anyway. In a town of ten thousand people, the only person who had a longer rap sheet than me was me - a clerical error at the police station entered me under Elizabeth Dicks when I was too drunk to remember my real name and the secretary lady was still new in town. I don’t regret those years, though - I learned from them. Or, tried to, anyway. In-between puking into toilets for hours.

  We’ve been here less than three minutes, and Ellie already has tons of sleazy guys lining up to buy her drinks. Some things never change. I make a mental note to keep tabs on them in case they try anything, and they will try something, because Ellie is beautiful and sweet and buxom in all the right ways. She walks over to our table and passes a margarita off on me with a wink.

  “Virgin.”

  “Thanks.” I smile. “It’s nice of you to remember.”

  “Of course I remember!” She takes a sip of her White Russian. “I’m so jealous of your willpower. I wouldn’t last a weekend without at least wine.” The music changes to something with hard bass, and she jumps up. “Come dance with me! This is a really good song.”

  “Yo
u go,” I say and motion to my drink. “I’m gonna rehydrate.”

  She shrugs and trots off, leaving me to soak in the cloud of cigarette and pot smoke hanging thick in the air like a scratchy wool blanket. Even in a slinky dress it feels like it’s suffocating me, hot itchiness stuffing down my throat and lungs. Strobe lights dance in arcs of blue and green lightning on the ceiling, the light glittering when it catches metallic makeup, throwing stars into the air. If I close my ears and drown out the crowd, it’s almost beautiful. I can almost, almost relax and enjoy myself.

  But there’s too many eyes on my scar for me to ever feel comfortable. People stare like I’m an alien from the furthest asteroid. There’s something wrong with the club, too. Something in the air. I can feel it. Or maybe there’s just something wrong with me. I haven’t been to a club in years. Maybe that’s it? Maybe I’m just getting old and crotchety about these sorts of thing?

  I look around. Faces shining with sweat and alcohol bob and sway to the music.They all look the same.

  And then my eyes catch on someone.

  ‘Someone’ is too vague a word for this guy. He’s not a someone. He’s Someone, the kind of Someone that sticks for weeks and weeks after you make eye contact, his echoes reverberating as an insidious, tantalizing ‘what if’ in your mind. He’s tall and lean and sinfully good-looking in a black sweater and jeans. He’s beautiful. And I don’t say a man is beautiful lightly - or ever. Men don’t impress me. But this one does. Barely. And only because of his looks, which doesn’t count for much in my book. Most beautiful people are hollow inside, like a fruit bugs have eaten from within. My mom is the star example of the rule. Ellie is the one and only exception.

  I shake my head and focus, trying to see him better through the darkness and smoke. The man’s white-blonde hair is long and sleek like silk, most of it tied back in a low ponytail, the kind that looks stupid on most people but somehow comes off as incredibly hot on him. His hazel eyes are a heated mix of melting gold and cinnamon. I could cut myself in a thousand pieces on his razor-sharp cheekbones. But he’s not the sort of man you touch. His face is set, collected, and serious. His height alone is intimidating, but combined with his relaxed posture he resembles a reclining lion - regal and deadly. He gives off an air of the sort of man who does the touching, exactly when - and where - he pleases. The drop-dead gorgeous brunette at his side is the only reason he isn’t being hit on like a baseball in the World Series right now. Her silver-sequined dress is stunning, some sort of delicate chainmail overlaying her arms and the exposed skin of her neck. She and Ellie share a body-type; long-limbed and supple, with more curves than a mountain highway. Add the way the woman carries herself like an elven queen, and the rest of the girls in this club have their egos crushed before they can even try to strike up a conversation with the blonde man.