Queen of Broken Hearts

QUEEN OF BROKEN HEARTS

Jennifer Recchio

Copyright © 2013 Jennifer Recchio

All rights reserved by that one guy who always gets the good table before you.

Cover by Stephanie Mooney at mooneydesigns.net

Edited by Red Adept Publishing

Don’t turn your screen off, just because it’s me. Don’t—I need you to listen, okay? Listen like you wouldn’t this morning, when you said some things and I said the wrong thing. “I’m sorry,” is what I was trying to say, but it didn’t come out right. Just—let me explain. This is what actually happened before you went running off and stopped being maybe almost in love with me.

Static from the electronically-induced thunderstorm raised the hair on my arms. “If you’d only listen to me,” I screamed over the beginning rumbles of thunder.

The movie set around us was a skeleton of an outdoor scene, waiting for the initial special effects testing to be done before it was completed. Pak climbed down from a ladder propped up against the star-studded backdrop. Lightning threw his tall profile into stark relief. “Give me one good reason to.”

I blinked stale water out of my eyes. If I could have thought of a single decent reason, I might have been able to answer. The artificial rain beat down on my head and puddled around my feet.

“What do you want me to say, Birdie? That it’s okay that you used me in your stupid little game? You set me up.” His voice cracked with the thunder.

“I just—” I pretended the rest of what I said was lost to the fans kicking on, adding a tornado.

“I always knew you were a bitch, Birdie, but I thought I meant something to you.”

“You do!” I reached a hand out to him. “You’re my—” I didn’t have the words to finish that sentence.

“I’m what?” He stood in front of me, the storm he’d created screaming around us. “Just answer me that. I’m your what?”

No, that doesn’t make any sense. Let me try starting earlier.

The back of the seat stank of sweat and smoke against my nose. I don’t remember whom my mother stole the car from. Thunder vibrated the windows. My fingernails dug into the cheap polyester of the seat.

Mother reached over and squeezed my knee. “Just a little further, baby. There’s blue skies ahead.”

That’s a terrible beginning. Went way too far back, that time.

Okay, one more.

So I was walking down the school hallways, minding my own business—

Except, no, I wasn’t. I need to explain. One more rewind. Last one, I swear. So on Monday, I was planning the guest list for my election party while I drove to school.

“Grass Johnson?” Skittle asked, holding back her thin blond hair with one hand, and clutching a stack of notecards in the other.

“Attention hog.” My car grumbled to itself as I sat in traffic with my foot on the brake. It was a little windy, with the convertible top down, but not nearly as bad as Skittle’s flyaway hair dramatics would have had you believe. My hair, for example, remained straight and stylish. “She’ll show up in some slutty outfit and hit on every guy there.” Her parents are moderately important agents in the world of acting, but really, she wasn’t worth the trouble.

How many more names could be on my list? I was already tired of it, and we were barely ten minutes into the nearly hour-long drive to school.

It’s only a fifteen-minute walk from my mother’s mansion to my high school, but I always drive, no matter how bad the traffic makes it. I didn’t get a shiny blue Thunderbird for it to sit in the driveway, and anyway, I’m not walking across dirty pavement in my Jimmy Choos.

“Madison Avery?”

“Please.” I rolled my eyes. I hadn’t even talked to Madison in over a year. I wasn’t about to mess up my party by inviting some Goody-Two-Shoes like her. Okay, so she isn’t really a Goody-Two-Shoes, but I’ll get to that.

Skittle chewed the top of her pen. I don’t know how many times I’ve told her not to do that. Skittle’s parents own a small movie studio. They do well enough to send her to the same private school as me, but not well enough to be truly famous. At Hollywood Hills High School, it’s all about who your parents are.

“Tolulu?”

I didn’t answer.

We were driving past the abandoned playground. It was a park, once, but someone had bought it with the intent of tearing it down to build something, like a mansion or a movie studio, before they ran out of money and couldn’t sell it. Anyway, no one climbs the rusted monkey bars or sits in the abandoned swing set anymore. Except me.

And Pak.

And all the tiles in the tic-tac-toe board had been turned to
x
’s.

 
“Hello, Birdie?”

I hit the gas, nearly plowing into the car in front of me. Skittle screamed. Her notecards flew into the air and scattered across the floorboards.

What was he even thinking, leaving me the signal to meet him, as if I was going to go signal him back? I’d told him good-bye last time I saw him, no take-backsies. We were bad for each other, we’d agreed.

“Birdie?”

I ground my teeth together. “What is it, Skittle?”

“The most important party of the year? Happening on Saturday? We’re planning the guest list.”

I sighed. “Right, Tolulu. We have to invite Tolulu. Her dad just got that part in that big explosion movie.”

“You mean Michael Bay’s new movie?”

I waved my hand. “Yeah, that. Add her. Next?”

Let’s see, what happened next? Classes, scheming, more classes. Then I went to lunch.

You want to know a secret? Expensive private school food is still school food. They only dish out the good stuff when the parents show up.

I drew
x
’s in my Salisbury steak, my mind still back on that playground with the tiles.

“It’s only going to be the best Queen of Heart election bash ever,” Skittle babbled to my followers beside me. Largesse, a thin theater nut boy with more hair than brains, nodded enthusiastically as she talked.

It might have seemed a little premature to plan a victory party before the election had even started, but there wasn’t really any doubt that I was going to win. No one was running against me yet. Anyway, with the nomination on Saturday and the election on Wednesday, it was too tight a timeline for two separate parties. Past candidates had petitioned to get the election period made longer, but the school board had decided the competition would be too much of a distraction from schoolwork.

Songbreeze, runner of the school tabloid and all-around gossip spreader, scribbled notes in a journal as she straddled a chair just far enough away from the table to make it clear she wasn’t really associated with us. “Any response to the accusations that you haven’t been fulfilling your campaign promise to end the hierarchy?”

“No comment,” I said.

Popsicle, my best enforcer, shifted her chair in front of Songbreeze.

Songbreeze is the daughter of an MGM executive. She distributes her tabloid for ten bucks a pop every Monday. My copy was sitting by my lunch tray. The top story of the day was, “Lizard and Wizard. Will they last forever?”

Spoiler: They didn’t last the week.

Anyway, no one misses Songbreeze’s tabloid. No one.

Not even my former best friend Annabelle Reynolds. I watched her slide into a seat on the opposite side of the cafeteria, dark sunglasses hiding her eyes.

Annabelle is a nobody. Her parents are actors with big dreams and no callbacks. She got in here on a scholarship. She makes better grades than the entire student body combined, probably because she actually wants to go to college.

I looked away. My past was gnawing at me, but I couldn’t let it. I had a kingdom to run.

“Skittle,” I snapped my fingers. “Have you booked the band yet?”

“I’ve been calling around, but Gaga says she doesn’t do—”

A freshman stood up at the table beside ours. Her chair screeched across the ground. She stomped over to my table in the ugliest pair of clogs I had ever seen. “I want to come to the election party.”

My entire table stared at her. The roar of the cafeteria dropped to a whisper hush.

“I can get a band,” she said. “I’m Facebook friends with Miley Cyrus.”

Popsicle choked on a laugh.

“That’s very nice…” I paused. I had no idea who she was.

“Lightbulb,” she supplied.

In any other place, I would’ve thought she’d gotten confused and started listing inanimate objects. But this was Hollywood Hills, domain of the strangely named and forgotten celebrity children. Besides, a girl named Birdie couldn’t criticize anyone’s name.

“That’s very nice, Lightbulb, but freshmen can’t attend the election party. Inviting you would violate an ancient tradition.”

“You broke the tradition by crashing it last year.”

I tightened my fingers around my fork. “But I’ve since realized the value of respecting the past. You can attend next year. Your time will come, eventually.” I reached out to pat her hand, but she snatched it back.

I knew the look that came into her eyes then. It’s the same look that was in my eyes my freshman year when Athena Clark smashed my lunch on the floor after I sat at the wrong table. Lightbulb drew in a deep breath. I held mine.

“
Down with the Queen of Broken Hearts
!” Lightbulb yelled.

“Birdie?” Largesse said. My flunkies all turned to me.

I raised my head, imaginary crown firmly in place. “Dunk her.”

Lightbulb barely had time to gasp before Popsicle grabbed the nearest bottle of carbonated goodness and poured it out over Lightbulb’s head.

“Anything to add?” I asked.

Lightbulb stood frozen, pale blond hair dripping with brown liquid, her mouth working without sound. She stumbled backward, and it took me a moment to realize she been pushed. Annabelle stepped in front of her.

“Leave off, Birdie.”

I tapped a fingernail on the table. “Nice of you to come to call.”

Annabelle let out a sound that might have been a growl. My flunkies darted glances between me and her, waiting for orders.

I smiled, keeping my frozen facade intact to hide my churning gut. I couldn’t see Annabelle’s eyes behind her huge, out-of-style aviators.

“You are dismissed.” I waved a hand.
Take the chance to retreat. Please, take it
. I don’t think I really expected her to, so I was more than a little surprised to hear her heels clacking away. Part of me wanted to stand up and call her back, as if I could rewrite my life that easily.

I missed her. I couldn’t deny it. I missed having a friend I didn’t need to pretend anything for. I missed having someone I could rely on not to stab me in the back. And on top of that, I just missed Annabelle. None of my flunkies could switch from talking about advanced calculus to the latest episode of
Gossip Girl
as quickly as she could.

My flunkies settled around me. I granted them my attention. “Now, back to my party.”

A damp piece of Salisbury steak smacked into my cheek. I turned slowly, sluggish gravy dripping down my neck. Annabelle curtsied from where she held her spoon catapult.

Silence fell. Every eye in the room was on me, waiting for a reaction. I smiled. “You have terrible aim, but it’s a wonder you can see at all, wearing sunglasses inside.” I propped my chin on my interlaced fingers. “Trouble at home?” Translation: I can destroy you.

Annabelle didn’t even flinch. At least, I don’t think she did. It really was hard to tell. “So sorry,” she said. “You’re right. I was trying to hit your mouth. You worry me with your eating habits.”

“Worry about yourself.” It was a lame comeback, and I knew it. I could imagine Annabelle rolling her eyes as she walked away. The cafeteria returned to normalcy.

“Largesse?” I said.

He jerked in place, snapping his mouth shut.

“I’m going to need some paint.”

But more on that disaster later.

When I pulled into the driveway that night, I didn’t get out of my car. The lights were on in the house, and the driveway was full of cars. I had long ago stopped keeping track of my mother’s parties. I thought about staying out in the dark, but my stilettos were cutting into my feet, and I couldn’t stay outside any longer with only my own thoughts to occupy me.

Glittering people filled the house. I dodged them and the decorations with “SAVE THE SIBERIAN MOOSE” printed in bright red. I was a mere few feet away from the staircase and escape when my mother’s voice lilted over the crowd. “Birdie, darling! Come meet Mr. Fischer.”

I closed my eyes and counted to two before pasting on a bright smile and turning around. “Mother.”

She looked ethereal, with her blond hair and wispy silver dress, as if a single hug would dissolve her into mist. I never did dye my hair to match hers. If red hair is all I’ll ever have of my father, then I won’t wash it down the drain with a bit of bleach.

“Mr. Fischer is chairman of the board for Save the Moose,” Mother said.

“I saw the signs,” I said.

Mr. Fischer blinked. Generic is the only word I could think of to describe him. His tuxedo was unremarkably black, his hair a flat brown, his features entirely forgettable. Beside my mother, he practically melted into the background. Then again, the only man I’ve seen manage to stand out beside my mother is Rob. (Wait, I’ll get to Rob in a sec.)