Page 3 of Heartless

Some people have resting bitch face.

I got stuck with resting sad face.

“They’re just plastic.” I finish handing them up to her and swipe the sleeve of my hoodie across my face to wipe away any tear tracks left there. “I’m just a little delicate.” With my luck, I’m going to have a bruise on my face and look like the poster child for abuse. Coupled with the fact that I look sixteen instead of twenty-three, I know exactly what will happen if I have to go see the doctor about this for any reason.

Do you feel safe at home?

Do you have a boyfriend at school who has a temper?

I let out a soft sigh and smile up at my boss, trying to reassure her I’m fine and not going anywhere. Though in retrospect, Ithink, as I walk back to the window to slam the decal against it with all the rage of a toddler missing her apple juice, maybe she’ll give me a pity raise if Idoget a black eye from the menacing plastic pumpkins.

“His name wasCassian.” The words pull me out of my dreams of a seven cent raise and I look up at another of our regulars who dumps half a cup of sugar into every mug of coffee. Across from him is a woman I don’t know, though I think she’s been here a few times before. The Pancake Plate isn’t exactly booked every day, but thanks to being featured on some guy’s show about unexpectedly quality dives, we do get a steady stream of new customers checking out our twenty kinds of pancakes.

Though no matter how hard Martha tries, she can’t get the pancake burrito to take off.

I can only hope she gives up on it soon.

“He was just a kid at the time. Eleven or so?” the man goes on, stirring his sugar-laden coffee absently with a spoon.

He was twelve,I reply in my head, picking up a plastic bin and pulling the dishes off of a nearby table. It might not be my job, exactly, to do it. Martha’s son is our bus boy, but I never mind helping out. Especially since I know he’s taking every moment to study his ass off to get into college.

“He killed his sister in cold blood. Lived a few streets over from here, actually.” The man’s mustache twitches as he gestures with his head toward the window, as if he’s not just nodding at the movie theater and the gas station beyond it. Half of me wonders if hedoesknow where the Byers family lived, because it’s definitely not in that direction.

“Then he turned on the kid she was babysitting.”

My hand jerks in shock, and spoons clatter to the floor at my feet, drawing the attention of all three of our customers. “Fuck,” I sigh under my breath, studiously not looking up at any of themas I pick up the utensils and toss them into the bin. “Way to go, dumbass.” It’s not like anyone knows, obviously. But it won’t help if I’m being obvious as hell about the fact I was the kid Cassian’s sister was babysitting.

But…he didn’t exactly turn on me. Unless my memories are fake and my brain is lying to me, which, according to my therapist, can totally happen sometimes.

Run, Winnie.

I may have forgotten a lot about my childhood—most of it purposefully—but I won’t forget that.

Not the way he’d said it, with his hand tight on the long, bloody knife that dripped crimson to the wooden floor below us.

Not his ghostly blue eyes.

And not what Carissa looked like in the corner of her room, blood seeping from so many wounds and her eyes staring lifelessly at the popcorn ceiling?—

My hands jerk, and this time, the whole plastic tub goes crashing to the floor. I watch, unable to move, and it’s like I’m seeing it happen in slow motion. Like if I wanted to, I could just so easily reach down and catch it, instead of watching utensils and plates spill out onto the hard, tile floor at my feet.

Thecrashof it is just as loud as I’d expected and hoped against. Two plates shatter and a mug handle goes spinning off under the nearest booth. Utensils land like bones, crisscrossed in patterns as if I could read the future in their positions.

But all I see is the impending embarrassment from everyone here looking at me and Martha’s inevitable pinched face when she gets off her stepladder to see if I need help.

“Good job, Winnie,” I whisper, sinking smoothly to crouch on the floor. “Good fucking job. You’re so great at being subtle.” Thankfully, no one here except Martha really knows me, and even she doesn’t know the truth about why I know Cassian Byers’ story so well.

“Oh, Winnie.” I hear Martha sigh in concern, and she kneels down on the tile to help me throw plates and utensils in the bin. “Are you okay? Did something happen?”

“Th-the plastic was wet,” I lie, thinking fast to cover up the real reason I’d dropped it. “I was readjusting my grip and dropped it. I’m so sorry, Martha.”

“No, no need to apologize.” Martha waves it off one-handed, tossing chunks of porcelain into the bin.

“I am the worst,” I laugh ruefully. “God. I can work an extra few hours to make up for—” I break off at a sudden sharp pain in the side of my hand, and I hiss, wincing as I jerk my fingers up off of the bin.

I’m bleeding.

I stare at the red line along the side of my palm as it wells with beads of blood that stay stuck to my skin for a second, two seconds.

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