Wow! Yesterday was awesome!! HUGE THANKS to all the lovely blogger ladies who got involved in BROKEN's cover reveal. I nver knew when I started on this book that I would be so incredibly blessed. *wipes tears*
To recap yesterday's events, we revealed my cover for Broken, created by the artist
Steven Wood. We also revealed the first chapter to blog visitors piece by piece, alongside some review blogs who had ARC giveaways. So, for our faithful Oasis friends, I'm giving you the cover here, and the entire first chapter!
Chapter One
Cold seeps through my jacket while I lean on the wrought
iron fence, staring at the rows of headstones parading across the lawn of
Memorial Gardens cemetery. Lanes of crushed gravel snake in white paths through
the deepening twilight. Moonlight spills down an angel’s robe, collects in a
puddle at the foot of a chipped urn, and glances from headstone engravings. At
night, when I’m alone, it’s easier to fantasize about who’s buried there.
I drift along the sidewalk skirting the graveyard toward the
mausoleums, chain link fence clinking beneath my dragging fingers. I’ve haunted
this place, lingering on the border between the living and the dead, wishing
for a grave that will never exist. Two yards from the gate, a broken link cuts
my finger. Same spot’s been cut three times already. Thank God I had my tetanus
shot recently.
Absentmindedly sucking my finger, I wander until I’m even
with the tomb farthest from the gate. The bones of some of the area’s
wealthiest residents are interred within its gleaming white
walls—self-important snobs who even have a wrap-around porch on their
mausoleum. Daniel and I used to sit there, cracking inappropriate jokes, facing
the trees and drinking the whiskey he stole from his parent’s liquor cabinet.
Not anymore.
Echoes of us fill our seats now, Daniel’s long legs whole,
not broken, and stretched across the polished stone. One of his hands holds the
pint, the other hand curls over my shoulder. My profile is clear, aimed at him,
beaming love brighter than the moonlight. Curls muss his nearly black hair and
cast his face into shadow. A chill October breeze stirs the trees. Branches
clack above my head, brittle as old bones. Goosebumps coat my skin, my pulse
jumps. When Daniel’s echo turns to me, his face is broken and bleeding, red
shiny trails streaming from the crack in his skull, coursing into his hazel
eyes.
My breath escapes in a rush. The same loss tears through me.
And here I am again, living the hurt over and over, like constantly ripping off
a Band-aid to feel the sting.
Hurting is better than forgetting.
Daniel wouldn’t want me living in this limbo. He would’ve
screwed up his face into a comical mask long ago and shooed me away from here.
I’m so weak without him. I struggle to keep my chin up, and lose the sudden
battle with my tears.
After backhanding moisture from my cheeks, I jam my hands
into my pockets and turn from the fence. We’ll never sit together again, and
someday I’m going to have to accept it. He would want me to move on, not haunt
the graveside his parents will never give his ashes. Heart heavy and somehow
empty at the same time, I drift toward home. Fall leaves whisper beneath my
steps. Jack-o’-lanterns leer from porches, glowing faces following my every
step, as if they see the hollow space in me and find it familiar. The Wendell’s
pumpkin is particularly vicious looking, narrow pointy teeth and angular
flaming eyes, squatting like a gargoyle on the front step. Jason, a junior at
Shelley High like me, really went all out with the carving this year. He’s always
had a flair for dark and drama.
The front porch door opens with a screech of hinges. Mrs.
Wendell shuffles out, flowered house coat catching the breeze and showing her
corpulent, pasty white legs. She gives me a wave and sympathetic smile when she
stoops in her housecoat to blow the candle out.
Shrinking deeper into my coat, I keep my eyes forward and
hurry toward home. My loss bleeds out a little at a time through the mesh of
the Memorial Garden’s fence, but it doesn’t mean I like walking by myself in the
dark. I’m skilled at scaring myself with what I think might be watching me.
Even now, I feel the weight of a stare on my back. At least, I think I do. Of
course, when I was five I’d convinced myself there were monsters, too.
A ring from my pocket shatters the silent laughter of carved
pumpkins and tacky plastic Halloween lawn ornaments. Letting out a little
groan, I fish out my cell phone, and then squint at the screen.
Bree Ransom.
I click to accept the call, then hold it to my ear and try
walking and talking without the tripping in the dark. “Hey, Bree, wassup?”
“Loitering is against the law you know.” I can almost hear
her eye roll. Bree’s one of the few people who understands why I spend so much
time outside of the cemetery.
“Only if I get caught.”
“Well, that’ll never happen. That neighborhood you hang out
by is dead quiet.” Okay. So Daniel and I aren’t the only ones to crack
inappropriate jokes. The snap of a pop can opening punctuates her sentence.
“Those people aren’t going to tattle on you.”
“You won’t either.” I hop a pile of leaves on the sidewalk.
“Who am I to breakup your mournfest? Just tell me you’re
willing to wear a costume to the dance Saturday and I’ll quit pestering you.”
The papery sound of flipping pages comes through the phone. Knowing Bree, she’s
paging through the sale flyer for the pop-up Halloween store in downtown. “We
can coordinate if you give me enough time.”
Which is exactly why I hadn’t said anything. Bree might be a
genius in the costume and makeup department—comes with the territory for a
theater major—but she’s not a miracle worker. The longer I hedge, the less time
she has to force me into being a Zombie Twin, or Bad Faery Twin, or
Whateverelse Twin she’s plotting on subjecting me too. With us both being
5’5”-ish, with blond hair—mine natural, hers what my mom calls Bottle
Blonde—and average curves, Bree has a lot to work with in the Twins department.
“I’ll let you know.”
“Dying of anticipation,” she says, dragging out the last
word like Frank-N-Furter in The Rocky Horror Picture Show.
“Can we discuss this tomorrow? I’m walking and talking and
can’t hardly see the sidewalk…”
“Say no more.” She takes a swig from her pop, then says,
“See ya in the morning, Em.”
“Bye, B.”
Bree may be my best friend, but she will never let me forget
my walking, talking, tripping over a fire hydrant incident of last year. To
return the favor, I often remind her of her Orange Kool-aid hair dying event.
A branch swings in a sudden breeze and knocks the phone out
of my hand. Spitting swear words, I squint at the ground, covered with a layer
of gold, browns and red. It didn’t hit the sidewalk—no horrid crack followed
the fall. My backpack slides to the ground when I bend down, scoping the yard
to either side. Then, I see the faint glow of the screen display reflecting
from the underside of an oak leaf.
The screen goes dark before I can grab it, and I fumble in
the leaf litter through another string of cuss words before wrapping my fingers
around the hard plastic case.
Standing, I feel the same heavy stare wash across my face
like a warm damp cloth. Prickles crawl over my skin, my scalp tightens, and I’m
sure if I could see myself, the blue of my eyes would be swallowed by my
pupils. I spin slowly, taking in every inch of Seventh Street and its shadows.
Comfortable two-story houses, some with open porches, most with narrow siding
and painted trim. Grinning pumpkins, a skeleton in the Miller’s yard, Mrs.
Jones’ witch-in-a-tree…
As far as I can tell, I’m alone. The feeling of being
watched isn’t easy to shrug. I square my shoulders, tuck my aching loss away
where my mom won’t see it, and trudge the last two yards worth of sidewalk to
my house.
My trio of jack-o’-lanterns sits on the steps of our
two-story, the candlelight welcoming me home.
Under the moonlight the house has a morose quality, the dove grey siding
and black trim and shutters making it look almost emo. Through the big living
room window I can see Mom curled up on the sofa, nose buried in a book. I’m
sure Dad’s in the basement, tinkering on some project. Renfield’s sinuous white
cat body is curled in the window, crammed behind the loveseat.
Burnt pumpkin stink rises with each lid as I lift them from
the jack-o’-lanterns to blow out the candles. Porch boards creak beneath my
Converse sneakers when I walk across to the door. Dad’s been forever planning
to fix them, but never has. He’d much rather make picture frames and cabinets
in his downstairs workshop. Carpentry is his escape, like Mom’s is the next
best romance novel on the shelves, and mine used to be my bedroom and the
Internet. Hand on the handle, I pause and cast one last look at Seventh Street.
Still vacant, though a presence seems to thicken the
shadows.
The door opens onto the smell of bread and pot roast. Gray
and black carpet anchors the rooms. White walls, and white trim hold up whiter
ceilings. Varying shades of burgundy furniture squat around the room, a
conclave of fat, bloody trolls. Mom’s evening show chatters to itself in the
wavering light of the TV. She looks up from her novel, a smile softening her
brown eyes and deepening the wrinkles around them.
“How was the
library?” she asks.
“Silent as the grave.” I pull Renfield into my arms. He
squirms, skewers me with a cat glare of discontent at his upside-down position.
One gold eye has a black freckle in the iris, like Daniel’s hazel eyes did.
Kind of ironic. Other than me, Daniel was Renfield’s favorite person. The cat’s
purr matches the rumble of my stomach, finally growling to life under the smell
of food. “Any leftovers from dinner?”
“Of course.” Mom scans her page, then points in a general
kitchenly direction. “There’s a warm plate in the oven for you.”
At home, with normalcy crashing in, it’s easy to shut out my
loneliness and let the reality of the weight of my backpack press against my
spine. A heavy backpack equals lots of homework. Trig, Social Studies and an
essay on Machiavelli and the Humanist movement are not going to do themselves.
Resigning myself to a night of hitting the books, I grab an oven mitt and pull
my dinner from the oven.
Instead of settling in the living room and watching Mom read
while I ignore the TV, I sit in my normal seat at the dining room table. It’s
quieter here, and the faint smell of fresh cut wood from Dad’s latest project
drifts up the basement stairs. A wide, dark window gapes across the table from
me, a nighttime scene of the side yard and the skeletal trees reaching skyward.
The branches jerk back and forth in a sharp wind, a limb cracking and
plummeting to the ground—a macabre combination with the scent of wood death
curling in my nose.
My cell comes to life, the vibrate setting making the pink
thing look like it has legs. It jitters across the table, the screen flashing
green. I don’t need to look at the display to know it’s Bree calling again.
Shoveling in a forkful of potatoes and gravy, I let the call go to voice mail.
Hopefully I’ll dodge her Zombie Twins bullet tomorrow
morning. Homework is on my dance card for tonight, then shower and sleep.
You can add BROKEN to your Goodreads
HERE
You can preorder BROKEN from Baarnes and Nobel
HERE
You can preorder BROKEN fro AMAZON
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