The Broken Healer

Chapter 26: Change of Plans

Newt and Evelyn hung their heads. Evelyn felt like...what was the word they used in the Glade? Klunk. Evelyn felt like klunk. Emotionally, she felt like her heart was so broken there was no way to put it back together. And physically, the Flare had a solid hold on her body.

"It was bad," he finally said. "I guess I know what it's gonna be like, now, when we push past the Gone. I went bonkers, Keisha. Completely bonkers. I couldn't see, couldn't hear, couldn't think straight."

"I'm... surprised everyone walked out of that place alive. Especially me." Evelyn whispered, still horrified about what happened.

"Oh, man, guys. I'm sorry. Something ain't right up there, that's for sure." She tapped her right temple.

"I'm sure the stress had something to do with it," Newt said. "All that ruckus this morning. Our scheduled riots, but then a few buggen' loonies tried jumping Every after the planned riots. Like that wasn't bad enough- Evelyn wasn't gonna bloody make it back here, so we went to the bowling alley because it was close, thought we'd rest up, wait for someone to bring some...first aid stuff, then come back here. Then, of all the bloody things to happen, my...our..."

Evelyn didn't know what Keisha knew. Even if she had understood every word Goose, and the guys said earlier, which she obviously didn't, would it have even mattered? No one fully realized, not even remotely, what Newt and Evelyn had been through inside that old rickety bowling alley. The shock of their friends returning, the pain it took to stick to their guns and insist they leave, Evelyn having collapsed choking and coughing, taking a step closer to Gone, the trauma of how horrifically it all ended. The despair on Thomas, Sonny, Sonya and Minho's face had somehow burned into Newt and Evelyn's mind despite the fact that they had both temporarily lost it.

Evelyn was visibly shaking. She slowly did back down the wall, to lay on her good side, her head in Newt's lap. Her good side meant having her back to Keisha, she pressed her face into Newt, trying to hide from the pain in her heart.

"Newt?" Keisha prodded gently. "Tell me what happened in the bowling alley."

"Do I have to?"

"Yes, you do." She smiled, and it made him think of his own mum, returning from the fog of his memories. "Talk to me, boy. It'll make you feel better." I think they used to call it therapy, back before the world went to hell in a hand basket.

"I went crazy," he said, barely above a whisper. "We..we both did. That's all there is to it. We went crazy when I saw Tommy, Minho, Sonya and Sonya. They... they were... it's way too long of a story to tell. You've heard some of it. But they were everything to us. Are everything to us. I'm sure Lee would agree...it ripped my heart out to get the Flare, to know they were immune and I wasn't. And then it ripped my heart out again-"

"You have two hearts?"

"I've got nothing." Evelyn whispered. "Not anymore. It's been smashed too many times. It's all gone. Just a big black empty hole."

Newt laughed, the kind that popped through your nose. "What is this, comedy-hour now? I'm trying to tell you how bloody miserable we are!"

'Ok I'll shut up. Keep going."

He rolled his eyes and shook his head. "Anyway. It just about killed us to leave them after they went into Denver. Yeah, if I'd had two bloody hearts they'd have both been ripped out. So I guess I have three since one's still beating. But... when I heard that they'd come looking for us, and then even worse when they walked into that bowling alley... my mind just started shutting down. I was so mad, so bloody angry, it was like every liquid part of me had started to boil and shoot out steam. I couldn't see, I couldn't hear, I couldn't think. I lost control." He paused, frowning and pulling his eyebrows together. "Evey has explained it before but I never got it until then. You're just..so bloody angry." He finished lamly.