Half-Broken Hearts

I will tell you a story. You might assume this is a love story because of the title you have read. So, I won’t disappoint you. After all, this is for you to enjoy. Although I am not so sure you will enjoy my narratives since so few others can relate to them. Nevertheless, let me tell it to you.

Once upon a time, in a land far away . . .

Wait. Let’s steer clear of the openings that suggest fairy tales. My story is far from it. In fact, I have never written a fairy tale in all my long years! Let’s leave these tales to the likes of Stephenie Meyer. A prose about a vampire that sparkles is surely a fairy tale. Sparkling vampires. Ha! Tell that to Count Dracula. Okay, back to my tale.

This is a story of a boy meets girl . . .

Wait, wait. Is that not the opening line of 500 Days of Summer? Not good. I cannot afford to be sued. And the movie is easy enough to recall. I cannot afford to be dubbed as a copycat too. Let’s see . . . Oh, yes, yes. Here it is. Are you ready?

There was once a girl who carried her heart in her hands. It was half-broken. She was walking on a well-paved street where many people tried to appear busy enough to look important. And important they seemed to the girl. She was looking for someone, for something. If anyone cared to pause, to look, one would see the determined fire in her eyes. It was almost feverish.

She desperately peered into each person’s face. She raised her half-broken heart to each one, as if in offering. With every offering, she would ask a stranger one thing.

“Can you love me?”

The poor girl was answered with scowls and shoves and snickers and sarcasm. She was caught in a throng of people hurrying to God knows where—maybe to a nine-to-five office job where they revolve their lives around. Maybe they could not wait to kowtow to some bosses they considered as gods. The girl screamed helplessly while hands pushed and legs kicked. When the throng finally thinned down, the girl was lying on the concrete. Her hair was a mess, and she had scratches on her face. But she never let go of her heart.

She stood up testily. She seemed oblivious to her injuries. She dusted herself and continued asking the people down the street—teenagers sitting on benches, old people playing chess, brooding people reading by the lake. She asked them the same question.

“Can you love me?”

Some of them gave a slight attention to her pitiable-looking heart. Some ignored her entirely. When she was too tired to go on, she slumped down a small bench by the fountain. She was surprised to see that a boy was already sitting there, eyes closed, face upturned to the sun. The weary girl cleared her throat once, twice. The boy did not move. She summoned her courage and started in a small voice, “Excuse me . . .”

The boy slowly opened his eyes and turned to her, “What do you want?” slightly irritated to be disturbed from his reverie. The girl looked him straight in the eye and held up her half-broken heart. The boy’s gaze shifted from the girl’s eyes to the heart, then back to her eyes again. They were now brimming with fresh tears as she asked in a cracked voice, “Can you love me?”

The boy did not move. He continued looking into her eyes. After a few moments—they seemed like an eternity, really—the boy spoke quietly, “I think I can.” The girl’s eyes flooded and then it overflowed, yet she was smiling from ear to ear.

“Oh, for heaven’s sake, don’t cry here.” The boy seemed disgusted, but his expression turned mild as he took out something from behind his coat. He held it out for the girl to see. He too had a half-broken heart. His heart looked worn out, twice as worse as the girl’s scruffy one.

Now, it was the girl’s turn to shift her gazes from the boy to his heart. Her expression turned sad. She continued in her small voice, “Do you really think two broken people can make it work? Your heart is worse than mine. Can you really love me?”

The boy’s expression turned sad too. He carefully returned his battered heart back into his coat and looked up at the sky again. Then he quietly said, “I said I think I can.” He closed his eyes again, but his face now lacked the quiet calm he previously had. His eyebrows were drawn together. His lips were pressed. He actually looked pained.

The girl was distressed. She was ridden with guilt. She wished she had not said those words, but she had no choice. She had to find someone who could love her completely. She needed to find someone who could make her half-broken heart complete again. She stood up and turned to leave. Before she could take another step, she heard the boy speak in his quiet voice, “I’d still be here.” The girl turned back, but the boy’s eyes were still closed.

Her mind made up, she continued with her quest. She never wavered. She walked from place to place, offering her half-broken heart to anyone who would notice her. Don’t get me wrong. There were people who did promise they could love her. But they turned out to be wicked, with hearts blacker than coal. They trampled on her precious heart as if it were mere grass on the field. Her heart was left a little bit calloused every time. Numbed, she continued with her search. She did not know how long she had been walking.

When she had circled the whole world and still could not find what she was searching for, she was crushed. 

This can’t be it. This can’t be it. 

She kept thinking to herself. If her quest was not in this world, surely she could find it in other worlds, in other universes. So, desperate and alone, the girl traveled far and wide—farther and wider than the places charted by the maps of this world. She searched fiercely but to no avail. She gained nothing but more bruises and cuts for her wretched heart. It looked like it was already completely broken.

Hopeless and exhausted, she returned to her world. The world that so effortlessly rejected her. The world that gave her nothing but pain. But . . . she had a little bit of calm in that world. On a bench near the fountain. If she returned there, would she experience the same calm? Would she find the boy again? She still could not believe that his half-broken heart could sustain them, but her heart was more crushed than his own now. If she went back to that bench, would the boy do what she did so many lifetimes ago? Would he reject her too?

She did not know anything. She refused to think. All she wanted was some peace after her endless struggle. Once again, she summoned every ounce of courage left in her and walked wearily to the bench near the fountain. The boy was there. His eyes were closed. His face was turned to the sky. The girl gingerly walked toward him. She was about to open her mouth when she heard him speak in his quiet voice, “Welcome back.”

The girl’s weary heart swelled. She was hopeful once again. She sat beside the boy and asked her request for the last time, “Can you love me?” The boy opened his eyes and faced her. He had a small smile on his calm face.

“I think I can.”

Then, he returned to facing the sky. When he closed his eyes, the girl stared lovingly at her beat-up heart. She whispered, “Be better, old friend.” before she tucked it carefully inside her coat. Then, finally content, the girl raised her face toward the sky, closed her eyes, and smiled.