"Just tell me what happened." She's on her knees too now, her eyes imploring me to tell her the truth.
"Nothing." I spit back. "Please just drop it already."
"Fine." I can hear the anger in her voice but I don't care. Right now all I want is for her to leave. I can't deal with her questions. I can't even deal with my own questions.
"Can we hang out another night?" I stand and pull up the waistband of my sweatpants. "I'm wiped. I need to sleep."
She pulls herself to her feet and arches her brow. "I'm not letting this go. You're a wreck. We'll talk about it tomorrow."
I don't respond. I can't. I don't know how to form the words to tell anyone that the man I'm crazy about, the man who gave me more pleasure than anyone ever has only wanted me because his dead girlfriend's heart is beating in my chest.
***
. "What do you know about my heart donor?" The question is blunt and it's ripe with emotion but I try to pepper that with a smile.
My mother doesn't flinch. "Not much. Why?"
I stare at her reflection in the oversized mirror watching her painstakingly apply her make up. "I'm curious."
"That was a lifetime ago, Sadie." She purses her lips together as she applies a generous coating of mascara to her false eyelashes. Her beauty is fading and it's obvious that she believes that with more make up no one will be the wiser.
"Not to me," I counter. "I've been thinking about my donor a lot lately."
"You should focus on the here and now. School's starting again soon." It's her usual comeback. Anytime I ask about anything other than her, she throws school back at me.
"Not for another six weeks." I spit back.
"How's work?" she casually tosses the question into the air.
"Fine, Mother." I sigh. "Tell me what you know about my donor."
She locks eyes with me in the mirror and I swear I hear her curse softly. Her refusal to talk about my heart has always been a sticking point with us but I'm not letting her slink out of the room without a full confession about what she knows.
"Tell me." I repeat this time with a slight hint of anger edging the words.
"It wa
s a girl." She spins around in her chair to face me. "A teenager. She died in a car accident."
The words feel like an assault. She knew this all along and never shared it with me. "What was her name?"
"That I don't know." She twirls a tube of lipstick between her fingers. "All I know is she was a little older than you and was in a horrible wreck. A bunch of kids were in a car and she was thrown through the windshield when it crashed."
"How do you know that?"
"Daddy heard two nurses talking about it that night." The way she turns the chair back around signals she wants the conversation to be over.
"And you never bothered to find out who she was?" I shoot her a pleading look. I can't understand why she didn't pursue it.
"Why would I have done that?" She traces the bright crimson lipstick around her mouth, blotting her lips with a tissue.
"I lived because she died." I almost scream the words at her. "Didn't you want to talk to her parents at least?"
"What would I have said?" She tightens her gaze so she's glaring at me. "Thank you for letting my daughter live? I'm sorry yours died?"
I close my eyes. She was a daughter. Coral was someone's daughter. She was Hunter's girlfriend and people loved her. The Pandora's Box that Hunter opened was in my hands now. I needed answers and there was only one person who could give them to me.
Chapter 2