Broken Heart Club

by Cathy Cassidy

  Chloe, Flick and Ima are outside, waiting for Flick’s dad to pick them up.

  ‘Eden left,’ Chloe tells me. ‘We told her to hang on, that Flick’s dad would drop her home, but she wouldn’t wait. She looked upset – what did you say to her, Ryan Kelly?’

  ‘Nothing!’ I protest.

  ‘You’d better not have,’ Ima threatens.

  I wave to the girls and break into a run, following the route Eden was most likely to take, and I finally catch up with her by the park.

  ‘Eden,’ I say, catching hold of her wrist. ‘Wait up! Where are you going?’

  Her blue eyes slide right past me as if I’m not there.

  ‘I’m going home,’ she says, heading for the park gates. ‘I shouldn’t have come …’

  ‘You can’t just wander around in the dark on your own,’ I argue. ‘I’ll walk you home, if that’s where you’re going. What’s wrong?’

  ‘Please, just go away!’

  ‘Look, the park’s not such a great idea,’ I argue. ‘Not in the dark, not on your own …’

  ‘I’m not on my own, am I?’ she counters, irritated. ‘You’re here. Why are you here again?’

  ‘I’m being helpful,’ I say.

  ‘You’re being a pain.’

  ‘Tell me what’s wrong, Eden,’ I say. ‘What happened? What did I do?’

  ‘You think it’s all about you, is that it?’ she snaps. ‘Well, get a grip, Ryan. The world doesn’t revolve around you. I’ve just had enough of the party, OK? Smashed up kitchens and police raids and hiding in cupboards is not my idea of fun.’

  ‘It was fun, though, wasn’t it?’ I tease. ‘Admit it!’

  Her eyes flash with anger. ‘Has anyone ever told you that you’re the most annoying boy in the world?’

  ‘Loads of people, all the time,’ I admit. ‘If you want to insult me, be original at least.’

  ‘You’re ridiculous!’ she snaps. ‘Idiotic, psychopathic, rebellious, stupid …’

  ‘Don’t hold back, now,’ I say. ‘Say what you think.’

  ‘I will,’ she replies, her voice shaking. ‘You’re throwing your life away, asking for trouble. It’s like you actually enjoy being the school troublemaker.’

  ‘Maybe I do.’

  ‘Which proves my point,’ Eden huffs. ‘Idiotic. Stupid. And you’re always sticking your nose in where it’s not wanted. Why can’t you get the message and just leave me alone?’

  ‘Because I can’t,’ I say. ‘I’ve tried, and I suppose I managed for a while, but the truth is I just can’t. I care about you, Eden.’

  ‘Nobody asked you to care!’

  It’s like watching the ice melt after a long, hard winter; the waters beneath are wild, dangerous, unpredictable. Eden’s icy shell is falling away, but underneath there is chaos. Luckily, I like chaos a lot.

  I shrug. ‘Too bad,’ I say. ‘You don’t get to decide whether I care or not, Eden. I just do. It’s not a crime, y’know!’

  ‘It just feels … wrong,’ she says.

  That makes me sad, because nothing has ever felt more right to me than being with Eden Banks.

  30

  Eden

  I can’t hate Ryan, no matter how I try. We walk together to the children’s playground, and I sit on the old wooden roundabout, curled up, face buried against my knees, hugging my legs. Ryan pushes the roundabout gently, then sits down on the segment next to me.

  We don’t talk for a long time; we just sit in the darkness as the roundabout spins slowly.

  ‘I shouldn’t have kissed your ear,’ Ryan says eventually. ‘It probably brought back bad memories, right? Of the camp-out sleepover … Andie’s birthday. I didn’t think.’

  ‘You never do,’ I tell him.

  ‘You just have such irresistible ears, that’s all,’ he quips. ‘I can’t help myself. Look, Eden, would it help to talk about it?

  ‘Not really,’ I whisper, and my voice sounds like dry leaves, like grit and sawdust. ‘Why start now? We never talk about stuff, Ryan. Not any more. Not for a long time.’

  ‘Maybe it’s time we started,’ he says.

  ‘I don’t think I can,’ I tell him honestly. ‘Can’t handle it. Can’t talk about it. Can’t even let myself think about it …’

  ‘We’re a mess, aren’t we?’ Ryan says with a sigh. ‘It all went wrong. We should have handled it differently. We should have talked. Maybe we didn’t try hard enough.’

  I shrug. ‘Maybe …’

  ‘We’re talking now, I guess,’ he says. ‘Better late than never. Seriously, I didn’t mean to upset you.’

  I shake my head. I feel empty, hollowed out, a husk of a person. There are no words I can find to properly explain the guilt I feel, or the shock I felt when Andie left. Ryan would never understand.

  ‘Parties aren’t my thing either, really,’ he says, kicking at the ground again so the roundabout, almost at a standstill, picks up speed. ‘All a bit crazy.’

  He leans back, looking up at the stars. His hair is longer, messier than it used to be, ruffled in the breeze. In the shadows he looks nothing like the Ryan I used to know, the boy who had my heart when I was eleven years old. Is he still the same boy inside?

  ‘Buzz and Chris went way too far,’ he is saying. ‘They just can’t help themselves. Spike the punch, pick a fight – it’s what they do, but this time it backfired big time. I feel sorry for Lara. Teenage parties are way too dangerous; all those teenagers, all those hormones, all that music and expectation. Somehow or another, something is always going to go wrong. This is much better – you, me, a roundabout in the park. If the excitement gets too much for us, we can always try the swings or the seesaw …’

  ‘Not sure I could stand the thrill,’ I say.

  ‘Me neither …’

  I smile sadly, uncurling a little to lean down and push the roundabout on.

  ‘Parties and me are a bad, bad idea,’ I say softly, settling back again. ‘Seeing everyone from school … well, it made me remember how things used to be, before. Does that make sense?’

  ‘It does to me,’ he says. ‘I guess … well, not everything is forever. That was a lesson we all had to learn. Things change. People change.’

  ‘Did you change, Ryan?’ I ask. ‘Inside, I mean?’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ he says. ‘Underneath my teen criminal persona there still beats a heart of pure gold … just don’t tell anyone. How about you?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ I admit. ‘I’m sort of scared to find out.’

  He looks at me in the darkness, grey eyes serious. ‘Don’t be,’ he says. ‘Don’t be scared to be you.’

  Then he leans across and kisses me.

  31

  Ryan

  On the whole, it is a lot better kissing Eden’s mouth than kissing her ear. Her lips taste of cherryade and sadness; her arms snake round my neck and pull me closer. The roundabout spins softly and my head drifts away, and when we finally draw apart we look at each other, wide-eyed, for the longest time.

  I am just going in for a second kiss when she jumps down and races off into the darkness.

  ‘Eden! Wait! I thought …’

  ‘You didn’t think at all,’ she snaps. ‘This can’t happen! All the trouble it caused last time!’

  ‘That was different,’ I reason. ‘We were kids then, Eden. OK, it caused some bad feeling.’

  ‘It caused World War Three!’ Eden yells. ‘It was the end of everything!’

  We’re out of the park now and walking fast towards Eden’
s street. ‘No, Eden, no; it was a silly, stupid row, that’s all. We would have made up; everything would have been OK …’

  ‘But we didn’t, and it wasn’t!’ she says.

  I try to put a hand on her arm, but she swats me away like I am some annoying insect.

  ‘Eden,’ I argue. ‘Listen! That stuff at the camp-out sleepover; the ear kiss, the argument; it had nothing to do with what happened afterwards. You know that, don’t you?’

  She doesn’t reply, just walks even faster, wiping her eyes again.

  ‘Don’t walk away, Eden,’ I say. ‘This is serious. Have you been feeling guilty all this time? Blaming yourself? Because what happened was bad enough without all that.’

  We’re at the top of Eden’s street now, speeding down towards her flat. The houses are big Victorian semis, some filled with families, some divided into flats. Eden’s flat is in one of the neater houses. A big apple tree arches over the wall in the front garden; as kids we used to pick all the apples the minute they appeared and eat them even though they were sour and hard, and we’d all get stomach ache. Who picks those apples now?

  ‘Eden?’ I prompt.

  ‘Drop it, Ryan,’ she says. ‘I can’t do this right now.’

  ‘When can you do it, then? Tomorrow? Next week? Next year? I think we need to talk, Eden. Properly. There are things that need to be said.’

  ‘It’s a bit late for you to start caring now!’

  ‘That’s not fair,’ I protest. ‘I’ve always cared, you know that. Stop shutting everyone out – stop shutting me out!’

  She opens the wrought-iron gate and slams it closed behind her, with me on the other side. She looks at me for a moment, her eyes smudged with blue shadow, her cheeks smeared with glitter; in the yellow light from the street lamp she looks more beautiful than ever.

  ‘I’ll call for you on Monday,’ I say. ‘You’ll feel better by then.’

  ‘Ryan,’ she whispers. ‘I just … can’t.’

  I hold my hands up, a gesture of surrender.

  ‘Just friends,’ I promise. ‘No kisses, no hugs, no holding hands – no nothing, not unless you say so. OK?’

  ‘Ryan, this won’t work,’ she says.

  She runs along the path and I hear the click of a key in the big old front door, and no matter how hard I try I can’t think of a single thing to stop her.

  32

  Eden

  I am going to be a hermit, possibly for the rest of my life. It’s Monday and I’m still in bed at midday, festering under the duvet even though it’s boiling outside. The curtains are tightly closed to keep out the prying sun.

  The first time I lost Andie, it broke me. I knew I could never be the same again, so I didn’t even try; I took refuge in sad songs, dark clothes, a stay-away stare to keep people at arm’s length. I stumbled through life half asleep, my heart frozen, my soul numb.

  This time, though … I really think that this time will kill me. It has been two days already without a word from Andie. She said she’d be in touch. She promised, didn’t she? Well, she said she’d try.

  I’ve had a whole rash of text messages from Chloe, Flick and Ima, checking that I got home OK.

  My dad heard about the police raid, Flick texted. Now I’m grounded for the rest of the summer. How unfair is that? It was worth it, though. I have such a crush on Lara’s brother! Don’t tell anyone, OK?

  Are you going out with Ryan Kelly now? Chloe wanted to know. He is such a weirdo, but quite cute too in a scary kind of way. And he is funny, I admit. Is it true his dog is half pit bull and half wolf?

  Glad you got home safely, Ima texted. Wasn’t the party awesome? I have never had so much fun. Shame it ended badly. I’ve gone off Branston Pickle for life. Lara said you were hiding in the utility room with Ryan Kelly – everybody’s talking about it. Looks like you got hit with Cupid’s javelin. Geddit? Arrow? Javelin? Oh, never mind!

  I bury my mobile under my pillow, too grumpy to even think about replying, then dig it out again in case Andie calls. She doesn’t.

  There’s a sudden sharp hail of gravel on glass, a sound I remember from long ago. Andie and Ryan went through a phase of refusing to use the doorbell; instead, they would throw gravel from the driveway at my bedroom window to grab my attention.

  I’m out of bed in seconds, my heart pounding, but when I pull the curtains back it’s just Ryan standing on the path with his ridiculous dog. Disappointment curdles in my belly.

  Another bit of gravel hits the glass and I yank the window open.

  ‘What are you doing?’ I yell down. ‘Go away, Ryan! I’m busy!’

  ‘You’re still in your pyjamas,’ he points out. ‘That’s not what I would call busy.’

  ‘Can’t you take a hint, Ryan Kelly?’ I call down, exasperated.

  ‘Clearly not. I thought we had a date?’

  ‘We do not have a date!’ I tell him. ‘I didn’t agree to anything!’

  Ryan just shrugs. ‘Come down, Eden. I need your help, and I’m happy to keep on shouting, but I think your neighbours might get hacked off.’

  ‘Just go away, Ryan! Please?’

  ‘Hey, I’m happy to wait,’ he says. He sits down on the grass, opens a rucksack and takes out some kind of sandwich. Great. My front garden is some kind of public picnic ground now.

  I slam the window shut and slouch to the bathroom to shower and dress. In the corner of my bedroom, the two piles of clothes Andie sorted lie untouched; part of me wants to pick something shapeless and grey from Andie’s ‘charity shop’ pile, but I make myself choose scarlet jeans and a dark blue T-shirt. Dragging a comb through my hair, I stuff Ryan’s paper crane into my jeans pocket and run down to the garden.

  Ryan is stretched out on the grass beneath the apple tree, Rocket at his side. Ryan opens one eye and grins, as if I haven’t just been yelling at him from my bedroom window.

  ‘Cool!’ he says, jumping to his feet. ‘Let’s get this show on the road!’

  ‘Hang on, I haven’t said I’m going anywhere …’

  Rocket is leaping and jumping around me, pushing his head against my hand, snuffling, huffing, looking for ice cream. I drop to my knees to fuss him properly, smiling at how Ryan’s childhood doodles of his dream dog have turned into such perfect reality. Rocket is like every child’s slightly wobbly drawing of their dream dog, with a personality to match.

  ‘When did you get Rocket, then?’ I ask, stroking the dog’s ears. ‘He is so perfect … just exactly what you imagined. I never thought your parents would cave in!’

  ‘We got him from the dogs’ home,’ Ryan explains. ‘He was three months old and he’d already been rehomed and brought back twice. I knew he was the one; who cares if other people thought he was difficult.’

  ‘Was he?’ I ask. ‘Difficult?’

  ‘Yeah, definitely, to start with. He howled all night, every night, for a week when we first got him. He peed so many times on the hall carpet we had to throw it out and get a new one. He ate my school bag and my gym shoes and my maths homework – well, I didn’t mind about that, obviously. I took him to dog training classes but we got thrown out …’

  ‘Because Rocket stole the dog treats and you got caught smoking,’ I say. ‘But you’re OK now. You’ve stuck with him.’

  ‘That’s what you do, isn’t it?’ Ryan says. ‘With stuff you care about. You stick around and keep trying, and eventually you come to an understanding. Badly behaved boy, badly behaved dog; we’re a perfect match. We go running together, and that’s cool. Play footy. And he
has improved, loads. Although he did eat my mum’s new high-heeled sandals last week.’

  ‘Ouch,’ I say. ‘Bet that didn’t go down well. How did you make her change her mind, anyway? She was always so dead set against dogs.’

  ‘Trying to cheer me up,’ he says with a shrug. ‘After … well, you know.’

  I do know, but I push the thought away. I stand up, arms folded, shoulders square. It’s great what Ryan has achieved with Rocket, but he needs to know I am not some kind of project, someone to be rescued and rehabilitated. I do not want to be fixed up.

  When people from my past show up, like Andie did last week, it creates nothing but trouble. I was safe, secure, almost invisible, but Andie somehow tricked me into chipping away at the ice-queen mask, digging beneath the surface to find myself again.

  Look at how well that worked.

  ‘Well,’ I say. ‘Nice of you to call, but like I said, I’m busy today. Busy for most of the holidays, in fact. OK? See you in September, maybe.’

  ‘Nice try, Eden, but you don’t shake me off that easily!’

  Ryan fixes me with a steely, bright-eyed look and something flutters and flips over inside me. Two spots of pink burn in my cheeks, and everything I want to shout and yell and snarl at him dies on my lips.

  ‘I made a picnic,’ he says, cajoling.

  ‘You’ve eaten most of it,’ I argue.

  ‘Eden, I need your help … please?’

  ‘What with?’

  ‘I’ll show you,’ he promises. ‘C’mon!’

  He takes my hand and my traitorous fingers tighten around his as if this was what they were waiting for.

  ‘You said no hand-holding,’ I remind him.

  ‘I’ve changed the rules,’ he says. ‘Hand-holding but no kissing, OK? You get to call the shots.’