by Shen, L. J.
BROKEN KNIGHT
L.J. Shen
Copyright © 2019 by L.J. Shen
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written consent of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotation embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
Resemblance to actual persons and things living or dead, locales, or events is entirely coincidental.
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Synopsis
Epigraph
Music
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Epilogue
Acknowledgements
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Prologue
Chapter One
To Betty and Vanessa V., two talented women I adore, and to all the Lunas of the world
Not all love stories are written the same way. Ours had torn chapters, missing paragraphs, and a bittersweet ending.
Luna Rexroth is everyone’s favorite wallflower.
Sweet.
Caring.
Charitable.
Quiet.
Fake.
Underneath the meek, tomboy exterior everyone loves (yet pities) is a girl who knows exactly what, and who, she wants—namely, the boy from the treehouse who taught her how to curse in sign language.
Who taught her how to laugh.
To live.
To love.
Knight Cole is everyone’s favorite football hero.
Gorgeous.
Athletic.
Rugged.
Popular.
Liar.
This daredevil hell-raiser could knock you up with his gaze alone, but he only has eyes for the girl across the street: Luna.
But Luna is not who she used to be. She doesn’t need his protection anymore.
When life throws a curveball at All Saints’ golden boy, he’s forced to realize not all knights are heroes.
Sometimes, the greatest love stories flourish in tragedy.
“Someone I loved once gave me a box full of darkness. It took me years to understand that this, too, was a gift.”
—Mary Oliver
“Dream On”—Aerosmith
“Enjoy the Silence”—Depeche Mode
“Just My Type”—The Vamps
“Who Do You Love?”—The Chainsmokers feat. Five Seconds of Summer
“I Wanna Be Adored”—The Stone Roses
“Beautiful”—Bazzi feat. Camilla Cabello
“Fix You”—Coldplay
“I Will Follow You into the Dark”—Death Cab for Cutie
“The Drugs Don’t Work”—The Verve
“I Predict a Riot”—Kaiser Chiefs
Knight, 9; Luna, 10
I drove a fist into the oak tree, feeling the familiar sting of a fresh wound as my knuckles split open.
Bleeding helped me breathe better. I didn’t know what it meant, but it made Mom cry in her bathroom when she thought no one could hear. Whenever she glanced at my permanently busted knuckles, the waterworks started. It had also earned me a trip to talk to this guy in a suit every week, who asked about my feelings.
My earbuds blocked out the sounds of birds, crickets, and crispy leaves under my feet. The world sucked. I was done listening to it. “Break Stuff” by Limp Bizkit was my designated ruin-shit anthem. Fred Durst might look like a ballsack in a cap, but he had a point.
Thump.
Thump.
Thump.
Most kids liked fighting each other. Not me. I only wanted to hurt myself. When my body ached, my heart didn’t. Simple math, and a pretty good deal.
A pinecone dropped on my head. I squinted up. My stupid neighbor, Luna, sat perched outside our treehouse, bouncing another pinecone in her hand and dangling her toothpick legs from a thick branch.
“What was that for?” I tore the earbuds from my ears.
She motioned to me with her head to climb up. I made no move. She waved me up.
“Nah.” I tried to gather phlegm, spitting sideways.
She arched an eyebrow, her way of asking what my problem was. Luna was nosy, but just with me. It sucked.
“Vaughn stole my bike,” I announced.
I’d have beaten the crap out of my so-called best friend, Vaughn, if I wasn’t so sure I’d kill him by accident. He’d said he wanted me to lose my shit. “Get it out of your system.” Whatever that meant. What’s a system? What did he know about mine? About anger? His life was perfect. His parents were healthy. He didn’t even have an annoying baby brother, like Lev.
Luna threw the second pinecone. This time I caught it, swung my arm like a baseball player, and threw it back at her, missing on purpose.
“I said no.”
She produced a third pinecone (She kept a stash in the treehouse in case intruders came upon us, which was honestly never.) and made a show of throwing it at me.
I finally snapped. “You’re so dumb!”
She blinked at me.
“Stop looking at me that way!”
Another blink.
“Goddarn it, Luna!”
I didn’t care what Vaughn said. I was never going to want to kiss this girl. God help me if she ever asked me to.
I climbed on the tire swing and up to our tiny treehouse. Vaughn thought he was too cool for treehouses. Good. It was one more thing that was Luna’s and mine that he wasn’t a part of.
Luna jumped from the branch. She rolled on the ground, straightening up like a ninja and patting herself clean with a satisfied smile. Then she started running toward our neighborhood. Fast.
“Where are you going?” I yelled as if she was going to answer.
I watched her back disappear into a dot. I was always sad to see her go.
This was all so stupid, anyway. I didn’t know anyone who could talk Vaughn into doing anything. Luna couldn’t even talk, period. Plus, I didn’t need her help. I’d walked away from him because if not, I knew he’d get what he wanted from me—a dirty fight. I wasn’t like him. Pissing off my parents wasn’t a lifetime goal.
Sometime later, Luna came back riding my bike. I stood up, shielding my eyes from the sinking sun. It always burned brighter when the ocean was about to swallow it.
She waved at me to come down.
I threw a pinecone at her shoulder in response. “Rexroth.”
What? her quirked eyebrow said. She could tell me a thousand things with her eyebrows alone, this girl. Sometimes I wanted to shave them off just to spite her.
“I always get even. Remember that, cool?”
Cool, her eye roll huffed.
“Now, come up.”
She motioned toward my bike, stomping her foot.
&
nbsp; “Leave the stupid bike.”
We huddled inside the treehouse. Instead of thanking her, which I knew I should, I pulled out the pages I had printed earlier and arranged them on the wooden floor between us. Our foreheads stuck together with warm sweat as we both looked down. I was teaching her profanity in sign language—the stuff her father and therapist never would.
“Says here dick is a ‘d’ handshape tapping the nose,” I mimicked the picture on one of the pages, then flipped it on its back. “Oh, look. If you want to say fuck you, you can just give the person your middle finger and pout. Convenient.”
I didn’t look at her, but I felt her forehead resting against mine. Luna was a girl, but she was still really cool. Only downside was sometimes she asked too many questions with her eyes. Mom said it was because Luna cared about me. Not that I was going to admit it, but I cared about her, too.
She tapped my shoulder. I flicked another page.
“Waving an open hand on the side of the chin, forward and back, means slut. Dude, your dad will kill me if he ever finds out I taught you this.”
She tapped my shoulder harder, digging her fingernail into my skin.
I looked up, mid-read. “’Sup?”
“Are you okay?” she signed.
She didn’t use sign language often. Luna didn’t want to talk. Not in sign, and not at all. She could talk. Technically, I mean. Not that I’d ever heard her say anything. But that’s what our parents said—that it wasn’t about her voice. It was about the world.
I got it. I hated the world, too.
We just hated it differently.
I shrugged. “Sure.”
“Friends don’t let friends get upset over small stuff,” she signed.
Whoa. An entire sentence. That was new.
I didn’t understand the point of speaking sign language if she was planning not to speak at all, but I didn’t want to make her feel bad and stuff.
“I don’t care about the bike.” I put the page down and scooted toward our branch, leaving. She followed, sitting beside me. I didn’t even like riding my bike. It was cruel on my nuts and boring to the rest of my body. I only rode it so I could hang out with Luna. Same reason I colored. I loathed coloring.
She cocked her head to the side. A question.
“Mom’s in the hospital again.” I picked out a pinecone and threw it at the sinking sun, over the edge of the mountain our tree was rooted upon. I wondered if the pinecone made it to the ocean, if it was wet and cold now. If it hated me.
Luna put her hand over mine, staring down at our palms. Our hands were the same size, hers brown, mine white as fresh-fallen snow.
“I’m fine.” I sniffed, choosing another pinecone. “It’s fine.”
“I hate that word. Fine,” Luna signed. “It’s not good. It’s not bad. It’s nothing.”
She dropped her head down and took my hand, gave it a squeeze. Her touch was warm and sticky. Kind of gross. A few weeks ago, Vaughn told me he wanted to kiss Cara Hunting. I couldn’t even imagine touching a girl like that.
Luna put my hand on her heart.
I rolled my eyes, embarrassed. “I know. You’re here for me.”
She shook her head and squeezed my hand harder. The intensity of her gaze freaked me out. “Always. Whenever. Forever,” she signed.
I breathed in her words. I wanted to smash my stupid bike on Vaughn’s stupid face, then run away. Then die. I wanted to die in desolate sands, evaporate into dust, let the wind carry me nowhere and everywhere.
I wanted to die instead of Mom. I was pretty useless. But so many people were dependent on Ma.
Dad.
Lev.
Me.
Me.
Luna pointed at the sun in front of us.
“Sunset?” I sighed.
She frowned.
“Beach?”
She shook her head, rolling her eyes.
“The sun will rise again tomorrow,” she signed.
She leaned forward. For a moment, I thought she was going to jump. She took a safety pin from her checkered Vans and pierced the tip of her index finger. Wordlessly, she took my hand and pricked my finger, too. She joined them together, and I stared as the blood meshed.
Her lips broke into a smile. Her teeth were uneven. A little pointy. A lot imperfect.
With our blood, she wrote the words Ride or Die on the back of my hand, ignoring the state of my knuckles.
I thought about the bike she’d retrieved for me and smirked.
She drew me into a hug. I sank into her arms.
I didn’t want to kiss her.
I wanted to zip open my skin and tuck her into me.
Hide her from the world and keep her mine.
Knight, 12; Luna, 13
I was named after the moon.
Dad said I’d been a plump, perfect thing. A light born into darkness. A child my mother didn’t want and he hadn’t known what to do with. He’d said that despite—or maybe because of—that, I was the most beautiful and enticing creature he’d ever laid eyes on.
“My heart broke, not because I was sad, but because it swelled so much at the sight of you, I needed more space in it,” he once told me.
He said a lot of things to make me feel loved. He had good reasons, of course.
My mother left us before I turned two.
Over the years, she’d come knocking on the doors of my mind whenever I least expected her—barging through the gates with an army of memories and hidden photos I was never supposed to find. Her laugh—that laugh I could never unhear, no matter how hard I tried—rolled down my skin like tongues of fire.
What made everything worse was the fact that I knew she was alive. She was living somewhere under the same sky, breathing the same air. Perhaps in Brazil, her home country. It really didn’t matter, since wherever she was, she wasn’t with me. And the one time she’d come back for me, she’d really wanted money.
I was five when it happened—around the time Dad had met Edie, my stepmom. Val, my mom, had asked for joint custody and enough child support to fund a small country. When she’d realized I wasn’t going to make her rich, she’d bailed again.
At that point, I had made it a habit to tiptoe to the kitchen at night, where Dad and Edie had all their big talks. They never noticed me. I’d perfected the art of being invisible from the moment Val stopped seeing me.
“I don’t want her anywhere near my kid,” Dad had gritted out.
“Neither do I,” Edie had replied.
My heart had melted into warm goo.
“But if she comes back, we need to consider it.”
“What if she hurts her?”
“What if she mends her?”
Experience had taught me that time was good at two things: healing and killing. I waited for the healing part to come every single day. I sank my knees to the lacy pillows below my windowsill and cracked it open, praying the wind would swish away the memories of her.
I couldn’t hate Valenciana Vasquez, the woman who’d packed up her things in front of my crib while I’d cried, pleaded, screamed for her not to go, and left anyway.
I remembered the scene chillingly well. They say your earliest recollection can’t be before the age of two, but I have a photographic memory, a 155 IQ, and a brain that’s been put through enough tests to know that, for better or worse, I remember everything.
Everything bad.
Everything good.
And the in-between.
So the memory was still crisp in my head. The determination zinging in her tawny, slanted eyes. The cold sweat gathering under my pudgy arms. I’d racked my brain looking for the words, and when I finally found them, I screamed as loud as I possibly could.
“Mommy! Please! No!”
She’d paused at the door, her knuckles white from holding the doorframe tightly, not taking any chances in case something inspired her to turn around and hold me. I remembered how I didn’t dare blink, too scared she’d disappear if I closed my eyes.
Then, for a split second, her motherly instincts won, and she did swivel to face me.
Her face had twisted, her mouth parting, her tongue sweeping over her scarlet lipstick. She’d been about to say something, but in the end, she just shook her head and left. The radio had played a melancholic tune. Val had often listened to the radio to drown out the sound of my crying. My parents hadn’t lived together, but they shared custody. After Val had failed to answer Dad’s many phone calls, he’d found me some hours later in my cot, my diaper so soiled it outweighed my tiny body.
I hadn’t been crying. Not anymore.
Not when he’d picked me up.
Not when he’d taken me to the emergency room for a thorough checkup.
Not when he’d cooed and kissed and fawned over me.
Not when hot tears had silently run down his cheeks and he’d begged me to produce a sound.
Not at all.
Since that day, I’d become what they call a selective mute. Meaning I could speak, but I chose not to. Which, of course, was real stupid, since I didn’t want to be different. I simply was. My not speaking wasn’t a choice as much as it was a phobia. I’d been diagnosed with severe social anxiety and attended therapy twice a week since babyhood. Usually, selective mutism means a person can speak in certain situations where they feel comfortable. Not me.
The nameless tune on the radio that day had been burned into my brain like an angry scar. Now, it popped up on the radio, assaulting me again.
I was sitting in the car with Edie, my stepmom. Rain slapped the windows of her white Porsche Cayenne. The radio host announced that it was “Enjoy the Silence” by Depeche Mode. My mouth went dry at the irony—the same mouth that refused to utter words for no apparent reason other than the fact that when I’d spoken words aloud, they hadn’t been enough for my mother. I wasn’t enough.
As the music played, I wanted to crawl out of my skin and evaporate into thin air. Hurl myself out of the car. Run away from California. Leave Edie and Dad and Racer, my baby brother, behind—just take off and go somewhere else. Anywhere else. Somewhere people wouldn’t poke and pity me. Where I wouldn’t be the circus freak.