Chapter 246 : Beautifully broken

I wanted to talk. I wanted to talk to them more than anything else right then but even with the extra strength inside me to ease both Emmets and Esmee’s pain there was no way that that part of me was going to work right. The stupid thing was that until that very moment in my life I had always liked and respected science. I found audio output almost an annoying factor when there was so much going on inside my head but I had always been forced to speak. The irony of the situation irked me. The first time in my life I wanted to be vocal I had been rendered speechless.

It was my hands that I explored with first. They seemed the most external part of my body to work with so the less chocked up on the black smoke. To my surprise they worked as I wanted them to first time round and I enjoyed spreading my fingers in and out. I had feared for a few seconds when Sophie had seemingly possessed me that I would never be able to do anything with myself again but the movement was easy. It appeared when it come to my hands my brain was still controlled by me alone.
I saw Emmet looking suspiciously at my hands as I practised with the fingers and then very slowly moved it over towards his. He moved his hand closer so I could reach it and I saw the hope in his eyes again and then a smile as I placed my hand in his and made my fingers lock around his. It was hardly comforting or reassuring but it was all I had in me to give to him while I tried to fight for the control of the rest of my body. Sophie had been forced back to the shadows but it felt like she left my body with a new set of commands to make it work that I had to learn. How could she leave me like this? What fried would rearrange the way someone ran?

I moved my other hand next and directed it towards Esmee. The movement was smoother and easier that time and I could grab her hand with ease. It was amazing at how quickly after I had held of them both my confidence over my own body came flooding back in.

Pleased at my new freedom I moved my whole body closer to Esmee’s. She leant out and pushed my hair back behind my ears. Her face a mixture of relief and almost disbelief at what she was seeing. I wanted to tell her that I was sorry for what I had done. That I had never wanted to hurt her but Sophie had left me somewhere that I couldn’t quite claw back from right away but Speech was still something I couldn’t access right so is settled for a smile as I nuzzled my cheek into her hand. It wasn’t much but it made her face light up like I had always remembered.

“Hi there honey, you had us all terrified for a bit then. Are you feeling a little bit better? Do you know where you are?”

Where I was? I doubted there was anybody on planet earth that could forget the four walls of an ECA after they had spent some of their time in there, even if they went totally mad and even forgot who they were something like that would never fade.

I nodded to answer her question at the same time as I felt my bottom lip start to quiver threatening tears. I didn’t know why I suddenly wanted to cry. I didn’t even know what the feeling was that was inside me threatening to produce them. It wasn’t sadness – at least it wasn’t the sadness that I was used to feeling.

“It’s OK,” Esmee promised picking up on my sudden facial sadness. “Don’t be scared honey, we are both here and lots of people are going to look after no matter what’s happened. We can make it OK. I’m going to make it better.”

Tears dripped from my eyes as I nodded again even though I didn’t believe that she was saying. I wanted to. I wanted to believe that tiny little five foot Esmee could sleigh an army of dragons but we were not in a movie. No one was going to yell cut and open the ECA doors and take all the feelings away.  She might not make me feel like I used to again, and I might have to live the rest of my life inside a room like this one, slipping in and out of Sophie and myself until I couldn’t tell or couldn’t care which one was real.

“I’m broken,” I said my voice finding me and speaking out before I had even realise that it had come back in use. “You can’t save me Esmee. I am patches of odd cloth that no else wanted. I don’t even want them.”

“We are all patches and sticking plasters. We have all been held together with thread and glue and we have all fallen to pieces and left them around for someone else to pick up,” Esmee said holding my hands before smiling up at Emmet. He had been the one to pick up her pieces every time. He was her thread and glue and he didn’t mind. He loved every tiny mismatched piece of her like it was the most precious thing he would ever get close enough to touch.

“We are all broken Mi,” Esmee smiled as Emmet reached out and tenderly placed his hand on the top of her crossed leg.

“Beautifully broken,” Emmet corrected sternly, wincing as his only heart’s desire put herself down just inches from him. “You’re beautiful. You both are. Broken or not.”