Chapter 4

I crouched down and gathered the broken pieces of the pendant into my palm. The jagged edge sliced my finger, and blood seeped into the fine cracks.

On my eighteenth birthday, Grandma had fastened that pendant around my neck herself. Her hands were already so weak that it took her several tries before she managed to close the clasp.

"Hayden, you're always giving everything away to everyone else. When I'm gone, promise me you'll keep the things you love for yourself. Don't keep letting people walk all over you."

I'd squeezed her hand and smiled as if it were nothing. "As long as you're here, Grandma, I'll never have to feel that way."

But later, Grandma was gone.

And with her, the only person in that family who saw me as a boy who could hurt, who could cry, who deserved to be cherished.

I hadn't even managed to protect the last thing she'd left me.

The only love in that house that had ever truly belonged to me... they took it from me, gave it to Roman, and shattered it right in front of my eyes.

"Hayden, I swear I didn't mean to." Roman covered his face and burst into tears.

My mother immediately pulled him into her arms. "Don't cry. None of this is your fault."

Then she glared at me. "If he hadn't rushed at you, why would your hand have slipped?"

But I had never even touched Roman.

Peyton said impatiently, "Just get it repaired. It's not like it was worth that much anyway."

Stella pulled out a tissue and gently wiped away Roman's tears. Her movements were so careful, as though she were afraid of hurting him. "Don't cry. This wasn't your fault. Hayden's gotten way too hot-headed lately. Don't let it bother you."

No one noticed the blood still running down my hand.

Or maybe they did.

Compared to Roman's tears, though, it simply didn't matter.

I closed my fingers around the broken pendant.

Whenever I'd been wronged before, I'd always fought desperately to explain myself. I believed that if I could just tell them exactly what had happened, surely they'd understand me at least once.

But in that moment, I suddenly didn't have the strength to explain anymore.

I slipped the broken pendant into my pocket and turned to leave.

My mother shouted after me, "If you walk out that door, don't bother coming back! You're a grown man! Who could ever put up with that rotten temper of yours?"

I never looked back.

She didn't know I had never planned on coming back in the first place.

I returned to the hostel.

I was due to report to the Northwest Institute for Deep Space Materials the day after tomorrow. I packed the last few pieces of clothing I had left.

At one o'clock in the morning, Stella sent me a text.

[Roman cried all night. Are you happy now?]

I stared at the message for a long time.

I started typing an explanation. Then I deleted every word.

She wouldn't care, just as she'd never cared why I'd left in the first place.

Roman's tears deserved an entire night of comfort. My pain earned me nothing more than being called hot-headed.

I blocked every one of them. Then I dragged my battered suitcase toward the train station.

As I went through security, one of the wheels caught on the edge of the stairs.

A stranger helped lift it free.

"Traveling alone, young man? Nobody from your family came to see you off?"

I smiled, feeling strangely at peace.

"They have someone more important to take care of."

The train pulled away from the platform.

Looking down at the broken pendant resting in my palm, I finally let the tears fall in a place where no one knew my name.

It wasn't because I couldn't bear to leave them.

It was because I grieved for the boy who'd always believed that if he were just a little more understanding, someone would finally turn around and love him.

Before I powered off my phone, a few more messages came through.

They were still telling me to "be the bigger person," still demanding that I go back and apologize to Roman.

What they didn't know was that the boy, who had always been understanding and spent his whole life waiting for a single word of approval, was already gone.

And he was never coming back.