Broken

.1.

I sat down at the table, my hands knotted in my lap.

Today was the last time they would try for me. My twenty-fifth birthday marked a day that would lead me to forever or the day I would be recycled. I felt sweat bead on my forehead at the thoughts. I wiped it away. The room was so warm.

Why did they keep it so warm?

I had been in this room so many times before but nothing had stuck, it seemed that there was nothing that would work for me. I had spent countless hours praying to nothing that it would work each time I tried. I prayed endlessly that something in my brain, my body or even my soul, would shift to allow the pairing to stick.

I once again rubbed at the sweat on my forehead before swallowing against the dryness in my throat. They never kept any water on the table and no one was around to ask for any. Ami'la, my case worker had sat me down and left. I hung my head, fighting back tears.

Why did it have to happen to me?

I had gotten wonderful grades. I hadn't been in any trouble. My father was a genetic researcher for the Orrians and my mother had been a specialist for interstellar plant growth. Everything should have been perfect, I should have been perfect.

I looked at my hands, wondering how they looked fine when I was so broken on the inside. Something they couldn't fix with medicine or surgery because when the soul was broken and unable to bond, there was nothing anyone could do. I lifted my head as Ami'la opened the door. Her ever-present high heels clicking on the tile floor as she brought another man in.

One last try.

"Liv, this is Tony." Her tone was soft and I closed my eyes tightly, sending up a silent prayer that this one would work. That he was the one that would make my soul sing and my world stop, the one that would be my forever. I opened my eyes slowly and looked at the man.

My heart sunk in my chest, there was nothing, just like the times before. My mother used to say the heart never lied and it wasn't lying now. I stood up looking at Ami'la before shaking my head.

Ami'la let out a large sigh. "Then there is nothing more we can do, Liv." The door burst open and my heart pounded harshly in my chest, as if trying to escape its bone cage. The fear was all-consuming but I couldn't move as hands and arms wrapped around me, forcing the air from my lungs. I couldn't breathe and black spots danced in my vision as I gasped for air that I could never take in.

I sat up in bed with a gasp, my lungs greedily taking in air as my limbs shook with the panic that surged through me. I pushed off the remnants of the nightmare and pressed my hand to my chest, feeling how hard my heart pounded. The fear lingered but the powerful pounding was calming. I was still alive, as long as my heart beat in my chest I was okay. The urge to cry because of the nightmare was nearly overpowering but I fought it off.

I should have been used to the nightmares by now. They had started when I had turned eighteen, right after the happiest day of my life had turned into the worst. It was when everything had fallen apart, when they had told me I might be broken. It was always the same nightmare, the same car, the same room, the same faceless person Ami'la presented as my soulmate. It always ended the same as well.

I died.

I looked at the clock and sighed heavily, rubbing at my face. At six in the morning there wasn't much sleeping I could do with my meeting in two hours. The very last meeting I would have with her. I wondered if I could lie, could tell them that we had bonded but I pushed the thought away. I couldn't do that to myself or Ami'la. She had been on my case since the beginning. She had taken it when no one else would because they were all certain I would just end up being recycled in the end anyway. Turned out no one really wanted to deal with dead ends and heartbreak. I couldn't blame them for that.