rock

anyta sunday

First published in 2014 by Anyta Sunday,

Contact at Buerogemeinschaft ATP24, Am Treptower Park 24, 12435 Berlin, Germany

An Anyta Sunday publication

www.anytasunday.com

Copyright 2014 Anyta Sunday

Cover Design Natasha Snow

Content Editor: Teresa Crawford

Line Editor: HJS Editing

Proof Editor: Lynda Lamb

All rights reserved. This publication may not be reproduced without prior permission of the copyright owner of this book.

All the characters in this book are fictional and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is purely coincidental.

This book contains sexual content.

This is the story of how I fall in love.

This is the story of how my home breaks and is rebuilt.

This is the story of how I became a rock.

part one: igneous

igneous: of and pertaining to fire.

gabbro

New day, new stone.

Today’s is a small trapezium of coarse-grained gabbro that’s spilling through the fence of our

neighbor’s yard. I squat to pick up the grey-black stone, jumping when a fresh raindrop slides across it

and splashes onto my wrist. I squeeze the stone. Stone 3621.

The gabbro’s subtle weight increases as I tell it all the crap that happened today, my last day of

intermediate school. Nothing dramatic, just saying goodbye to my teachers and high-fiving my mates

going to St. Patrick’s and Scott’s College next year.

I drop the stone into my pocket and breathe in the perfumed air rising from the magnolias that flank

the street. Today smells different, like the cusp of summer.

Home looms before me, and I swing my backpack off before peeking into the letterbox. Emptied

already. I fling our gate open. Its squeals match the rickety fence and clumps of wildflowers I trample as

I walk across the front lawn. Ivy climbs the wooden pillars that support the veranda roof and give our

home a cottage-like look. Small and cozy.

Except something is off. The door is held open by a faded kitchen-appliance box and—

A high-pitched gurgle. I quicken my steps toward the sound.

My older sister Annie is sitting at the end of the veranda, huddled against the side of the house in a

crimson sundress, head bowed into her hands.

“Annie?” I drop my backpack onto the cracked brick path. Annie’s tears drop onto her Roman

sandals. “What happened?” I crouch and grab her knees.

Her green eyes resemble mine, flecked with hazel, one ever so slightly brighter than the other.

Enough to make strangers look twice.

Except now, as Annie blinks, she looks different. The skin around her eyes is swollen and red, and

the mascara she’s not allowed to wear weaves complicated webs over her cheeks.

Her mouth opens and shuts, and another sob rattles her. I don’t know what to do. She’s my big sis;

she’s usually the one comforting me.

I pat her shoulder. She rests her head against my arm, smudging her black tears across my skin. It

tickles, but I shake it off. “Did . . .” I swallow. “Did someone die?”

She shakes her head and relief sweetens my next gulp of air. I rock back on my feet. So long as no

one is dead, I can handle anything. Maybe her first boyfriend dumped her? Two days before her

fourteenth birthday, though? I’m only twelve, but getting dumped like that would have to suck.

Annie sniffs hard, as if trying to regain control. She wipes her tears, drawing the mascara outward

so it resembles cat whiskers.

“Our home is breaking, Cooper,” she says. All thoughts of cats flee my mind.

The appliance box that’s propping the front door open takes on a new significance. “What do you

mean?” I ask. But I already know.

My sister’s voice grows taut, strangled and angry. “It means a week here, a week there. It means

choosing Mum’s side or Dad’s. It means we have a new family.”

I don’t understand this last part; in fact, I can’t quite grip the first part either.

Clouds pass over the afternoon sun, and the veranda darkens like a bad omen.

“They’re getting a divorce?” It comes out like a question, but it isn’t. Of course that’s what she

means. They’re getting a divorce.

“It’s more than that.” Annie glares at me. “Dad has someone else. Do you understand? He has this

whole other life we don’t know about. He wants to move in with her, because she’s the real love of his

life. All those business trips? It was him being with her. With them.”

My breath comes in and out fast. I’m not sure I want more details, but I ask anyway. “Them?” This

can’t be real. Sure, Dad leaves for two weeks out of the month, but he always brings back gifts for us.

Always says he loves us to the moon and back. “Them?” I ask firmly.

“The bitch has a son and is pregnant.”

I flinch. “A son? Dad’s?” Our . . . brother?

“The son isn’t his, but the baby—” Her voice breaks. “I’m staying with Mum. I don’t want

anything to do with him. I hate him.”

Footsteps creak over the wooden boards. I don’t know how long Dad’s been standing there, but his

expression is tight and pain flashes in his gaze—green like ours. We are our father’s children.

But for how much longer?

Dad folds his arms across his old, oil-smeared shirt. He’s fit for thirty-eight, but the creased skin

around his eyes can’t be denied. I’d like to believe that his crow’s feet came from endless smiles, but all

I ever see are frowns.

I guess the smiling must have happened when he was with her. With them.

Dad looks from Annie to me, and his sad frown hits me like a punch to my gut. I can’t breathe.

“Cooper,” he says. It comes out raspy, like he’s been crying. “Cooper,” he pleas.

I glance from Annie to Dad, feeling like I have to choose. My breathing quickens and I need my

stone. Like, right now. I plunge my hand into my pocket and strangle this bad memory into the gabbro. I

look at Annie. At Dad.

Choose! Choose! Choose!

But I can’t.

basalt

Mum begs me to spend the weekend with Dad.

She stands tall and fair, with freckles that I didn’t inherit—save the ones on my toe and under my eye—

as she pulls out T-shirts, shorts, and socks from my dresser drawers. I hurry over to take care of my own

boxer shorts, thank you very much.

She pauses, arms full of clothes that are ready to collect her tears, but she holds back. I’m not

fooled by the façade of strength.

I understand why Annie wants to take sides; why she chose Mum’s.

“We were both to blame. Things haven’t been working out for a long time,” she says with a smile

far too bright to be real. “Don’t be as stubborn as your sister. It hurts him, not seeing you.”

“It’s only been a month.”

“He’s called every second day.”

“He left you, right? So he chose this.” But those are Annie’s words, not mine, and I feel guilty for

saying them.

“He left, but we were already broken.”

“Have you met his new . . . woman?” I ask, for lack of a better word—and because it sounds rude

and mean, and I want to spite her.

She pauses and unzips my duffel bag with a swift flick of her wrist. “Yes.” She looks away, but not

before I see tears finally rimming her eyes. “Lila was once a friend of mine. We’ve known each other

since our first day of university. In fact, she introduced me to your father.”

She packs my bags even though I can easily do it myself. But she needs something to keep her

busy, so I let her. She tosses in my journal, throws in last week’s collection of stones, and places my