Raining Heartbeats

By Esther Lac

Raina Lee, an academically inclined yet ironically apathetic high school student, was inching closer towards her graduation. Rather than entertaining grandiose thoughts about her future, she was always preoccupied with surviving the day. Each day weaved itself into an irregular rhythm in the context of her dysfunctional family and her introversi

• Language: English
• Publisher: Stratton Press
• Release date: Sep 24, 2018
• ISBN: 9781643451671

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Esther Lac

RAINING HEARTBEATS

Copyright © 2018 Esther Lac

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by information storage and retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

Stratton Press, LLC

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Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in the work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

ISBN (Paperback): 978-1-64345-166-4

ISBN (Ebook): 978-1-64345-167-1

Printed in the United States of America

Contents

Acknowledgements

The Sound of Rain

The Toxicity of Words

The Echo of Memories

The Whispers of Neglect

The Tears of Daisies

The Prayer of the Stars

The Voice of Silence

The Midnight of Escape

The Versatility of Strength

The Night of Unburdening

The Call of Courage

The Reality of Happiness

The Fault of Wounds

The Misadventures of Growing Up

The Ubiquity of Freedom

The Transition of Seasons

The Mark of Resilience

The Consequences of Forgetting

The Meaning of Life

The Revival of Hope

To Veronica Lien and Yoyo Siu

Acknowledgements

This book would not be possible without my friends who encouraged me from the time when this plot was no more than a spontaneous seed of an idea. I thank these friends for sticking with me all these years to see this seed come into fruition: Veronica Lien, Eunice Mak, Nicolle Mah, and Gina Park. Thank you for exploring plot ideas with me, brainstorming character names, helping me with research, suggesting tips to overcome writer’s blocks, and inspiring me with beautiful artwork and book cover designs.

Thank you to Jung (ElyonBeats on YouTube) for using your God-given talents in music to produce songs and beats that have accompanied me in my countless days and nights of writing and editing. You set a beautiful example of how we can use our raw and genuine experiences, emotions, and thoughts to serve God.

Thank you to my one and only brother, Daniel La-Lac, for always encouraging me to pursue whatever obscure passions I set my sights on. You’ve been a prime example of resilience, from which became a redeeming quality of my protagonist by the end of this novel.

Thank you to all my readers, especially those who have known me when I was just a faceless writer on AFF. Your encouragement fueled my joy for writing and was the catalyst that led me to publish my stories.

Finally, thank you to my Heavenly Father for giving me the right opportunities in the most perfect timing, and for raining down heartbeats—people—into my life who inspire me every single day. May my passion for writing be used to do Your good work.

The Sound of Rain

Rain trickled off the edges of her umbrella, sky blue as her oversized cardigan with long sleeves fitting loosely around her thin arms, soaking up a puddle beside her. She sat silently on her porch, allowing her legs to dangle and graze a larger puddle with her heel in a uniform motion. The ripples distorted her frown in the reflection, and for a split second, it looked as if her own mirror image was mocking her with a menacing grin. She stared at the dull-eyed face, its complexion shared a similar greyness to the sky, or perhaps it was the emptiness inside of her that momentarily casted her into a world of monochrome. The longer she stared, the deeper she doubted the fact that she actually had caramel eyes that melted into a warm russet brown in the sun.

Any moment now, the quietness around her would shatter at the mercy of thunderous yelling. Not even a storm could compete with the voice emanating from inside the house. She didn’t need to hear it with her own ears to be flooded with mental reminders of how deafening it would be. As she cringed, the tilt of her umbrella dripped raindrops onto her jeans. The denim quickly soaked them in, forming navy patches of fabric that felt icy against her skin. The fresh bruises on her knees were being numbed by the cold, leaving her with an aching feeling that came more from her fatigued spirit than her actual wounds.

She drew a heavy breath inwards, filling her lungs with the chilly autumn air. Panic interrupted her exhale as a muffled roar emanated outside from her living room.

To hell with this family! I’ll go file a divorce tomorrow, and you can take Raina to whatever dump you find yourself living in afterwards! The way her name rolled off her father’s tongue stabbed at her heart. As usual, she kept quiet in the midst of it. Outside, the only sound that dared to fill the silence between her father’s heavy breaths was the pitter-patter of raindrops hitting her umbrella. It didn’t really matter how often either parent threw divorce into their arguments; she couldn’t desensitize herself to it. Every empty threat had some basis for being said.

Coward! You are not going to throw the responsibility on me! The only reason we’re still living together in this hellhole is because neither of us wants to take Raina! Her mother’s voice shot needles into Raina’s lungs, and she felt like she was choking on every breath she breathed. What was worse than having parents who so explicitly despised their own children? A long silence followed, which seemed to drag on for an eternity—an eerie absence of sound that gave her inclination to panic more reason to do so.

The silence broke at the shattering of a ceramic vase colliding with a wall, launched from across the living room. Raina couldn’t bear to stick around any longer. Fighting hysterics, she shot up from the porch and bolted down the street, leaving her umbrella half-opened on her lawn. From a few houses down behind the protection of a pine tree, she watched her father stomp into his car, slamming the door closed before speeding down the opposite direction. The wheels skidded at the Stop sign and an angry honk followed before her father’s car was completely out of sight. Her father was an escapist only after he’d finished breeding hell on earth. The victims were always left to take care of the aftermath.

Raina turned her eyes away and continued her aimless walk to wherever. It didn’t matter where she’d go now, as long as she didn’t have to be home. Raina laughed sarcastically at her own mind’s choice of diction. That house almost never felt like a home. She wasn’t sure she even knew what a home was supposed to be. She walked with her shoulders slouched in defeat, dragging her feet forward as her ears drew in each intricate sound—the rain, her footsteps on pavement, car engines at a distance. Her hand combed through her thick, long, brown hair as she attempted to push her fringe away from her face to see the path in front of her. There was nothing spectacular ahead, only the promise of an escape. Even if just temporary, for Raina it was enough to not want to look back. Even if it was possible for her to walk straight forever, she’d eventually wind up back right where she started, so she cursed the world for being round.

The bell sounded minutes ago to signal the end of another long school day. Though a double period of math class felt like an eternity, it wouldn’t have hurt for the day to drag on a little longer. Raina sat beside the door of her half-opened locker, biology textbook in hand, as she compared her notes to the heavy pages of her book. Her fingers trailed along the sentences, underlining the words as she read.

Studying hard as usual?

Raina didn’t need to look up to know that Mari had taken a seat next to her. She flipped to the next page without answering. Mari had been friends with Raina since middle school, so even though they’d been growing apart, they remained on speaking terms at least. Most days, Mari’s friendliness and care toward Raina felt rather forced, as if their history of friendship obliged them check up on each other, as inconsistent as it was. When caring becomes so effortful, doesn’t it tell us that we don’t actually care anymore? Mari was now a proud member of the school’s drama club, and the way she carried herself had changed completely. Mari was more confident than she was three years ago; in fact, Raina would argue that Mari was leaning closer and closer toward narcissism each passing day.

Raina’s memories of middle school unraveled like a movie reel, playing moments of when Mari would lend Raina lunch money on days her parents neglected to give her any, and the times in gym class when they’d compete against each other for the title of fastest female sprinter in their grade. But that was all in the past now. High school had a way of changing people at a pace no teenager could anticipate. At the start of high school, Raina noticed the way Mari’s attention would fade out of conversations that didn’t interest her and how tactfully she would interrupt and reroute the topic to refocus on her own life and problems. Her habit of fading out was a gradual progression. Raina observed that, at first, Mari would only do it when they spoke about understandably boring things like homework, but it eventually transitioned to all parts of Raina’s life that didn’t actively involve Mari. When Mari asked a question, Raina made it a game to not answer her, to see if she would realize and ask it again. Raina played this game for almost three years and had lost count of the instances when Mari would ask Raina a question and move on without waiting or caring for Raina’s answer. She concluded that Mari quite simply didn’t care anymore.

Instead of adapting to these shifts in her social environment, Raina forfeited all sense of community and grasped onto something she believed to be of highest value for her future—her education. Every time her head started pounding or her eyes started stinging from reading textbooks and class notes, one trickling thought of her dysfunctional life was enough to get her back on track. Raina wanted an escape from the darkness that enshrined her—particularly in her home life—more than anything, and she’d bet that academics were the only way out for her. She could get through university with scholarships and student loans and work hard to get a sufficient job after graduation. If she could refine her time management further, she might even be able to slip in a part-time job. There was no room for leisure or play because if there were ever enough time for those things, she’d redirect it to spend on productive pursuits toward her escape. First though, she needed the grades to get into the postsecondary institution she wanted. Her eyes were set on the University of British Columbia; the exact program was still up in the air. She’d considered immunology or psychology, and she still had time before submitting early acceptance applications. They lived in Burnaby, BC, and even though commuting to school would take over an hour, Raina saw any hour away from home as a blessing. Maybe living in the dorms could even be a possibility. Raina kept her fingers crossed.

You’re done with the next chapter already? Dammit, Rain, your life really is as gloomy as your name. Mari laughed, pulling Raina out of her thoughts as she took a hold of Raina’s fresh biology notes. Mari brushed her long, brunette hair back over her shoulders and quickly scanned the words under the subheader key terms. Raina meditated on Mari’s words for a short while. Mari was completely unaware of how accurately her play on words actually described Raina’s life. Had they been just a fallacy, maybe Raina would have laughed with her. Since middle school, Raina took precautions to hide her personal struggles from Mari. Just as Raina didn’t know who Mari was anymore, Mari had never truly known who Raina was either. In that sense, they were even. Mari seemed to keep their surface friendship alive because she needed the extra academic boost. Simply taking Raina’s notes instead of making her own allowed her more time to focus on drama club—where her social life resided. Mari’s other friends and Raina were polar opposites in personality and interests, and Mari knew that they could never coexist together.

You have a language assessment test to study for tonight, right? If you won’t need these right away—Mari closed the notebook without any of the loose leafs slipping out by spreading her hand over the cover—I’ll just borrow them and give them back first thing in the morning. Raina didn’t want to comply, but she had no better reason to object. She just wanted to be useful because if she stopped, Mari would probably cease to speak to her. Raina didn’t fully understand why that alternative would bother her though. They were in their first semester of senior year, and it was thanks to Raina that Mari had made it this far. Raina nodded hesitantly, receiving a bright smile from Mari in return. Mari’s sincerity never reached her eyes. Afterwards, Raina was left alone in the hallway. The other students always cleared out of the halls quickly, either to catch a bus or get to their club activities. As she pushed her locker door closed, she dreaded the idea of possibly going home to an unwelcomed storm. Today was Tuesday. Her father had days off on Tuesdays.

Most students dreaded Mondays because it marked the beginning of a long week of school and stressful nights of studying (or procrastinating), but most students didn’t have a tyrant father loafing around at home making Mondays feel like a breath of fresh air compared to Tuesdays. She could only remember instances when her father, having too much free time on his hands, would make a mess of the house when he was intoxicated with alcohol. Of course, it was then Raina’s unspoken duty to clean up after him. She often felt more like a maid than a daughter.

He once punched a hole in the wall because Raina’s mother asked him to drink one less can of beer a day. Perhaps approaching the subject after his fourth can wasn’t the wisest decision. What started as lighthearted nagging escalated quickly into a war of accusation. The hole that scars the living room wall was now covered by a cheap painting of a lilac bush Raina’s mother had picked up at a local thrift store for only about two bucks. Everyone in the house knew the hole was there, but there was some comfort in hiding it and pretending that the gaping hole that alluded to the brokenness in their family life did not actually exist.

Raina began observing at an early age, different strategies that adults would use to hide their flaws—to put on a more dignified image that reflected who they wanted to be, but not who they really were. Raina knew their personas were lies birthed from defense mechanisms that she learned through observation. Behind the closed doors of their homes was when the pathetically ugly truth would ooze out. It’s always when no one’s around to see or hear that Raina’s father would break something made of glass or lose his temper and puncture a wall. Why did adults expend so much energy creating a public guise that reflected them no more accurately than stickmen drawings did of real people? Raina hated when her father’s colleagues would praise him for his hard work, telling her that she was lucky to have him as a father.

If they knew what he was really like, they would never say that.

Her thoughts would never come to pass through her lips, so to others her quietness became synonymous with acceptance.

The walk home from school was chilly despite the tall trees forming a natural shield between Raina and the wind. Intermittently, Raina could see specs of the gloomy sky beyond the branches. There was no specific season for rain in British Columbia, the province was notoriously known for its rainy seasons year-round. In middle school, Raina always took the bus home with Mari, but with how their friendship progressed in high school, she preferred walking to avoid unnecessary contact. She only resorted to bussing when the weather was particularly relentless. Another bonus to walking was the longer it took, the more time she could spend weakly grasping onto a fragment of solace before entering the storm that often awaited her at home.

To Raina, this after-school routine wasn’t as lonely as it would appear to an onlooker. There was peace in confronting silence; peace in embracing it as a means of release from a long day of forced smiles and unvoiced complaints. In the noisiness of the classroom was where Raina felt the most alone. Loneliness became defined by how obvious it was to observers that everyone else ostracized an individual. In crowded places like school, she’d rather just be invisible. It was only in the stillness, when she chose to be by herself, that she could find consolation.

As she trailed on through her typical route home, she kicked a small pebble along, losing track of the precious time she had to feel safe in her quietness. The small pebble rolled down the curb of the sidewalk and tumbled into the gutter, right in front of her father’s car. It was the first time she noticed so many cracks between scratches on the front bumper.

How many times has he committed a hit-and-run?

Sighing, she stood up straighter and tried peering through the living room window, though her sight was obstructed by the old, faded blue drapes. They were just opaque enough to reveal silhouettes if the living room lights were on. At this time of day, Raina could see nothing.

The quietness of her neighborhood was a deception. Raina knew that the moment she stepped into her house, the quietness would shatter under the weight of her father’s perpetually angry voice. She hesitated on the sidewalk in front of her house. She had a Korean language assessment tomorrow to study for, so without a second glance, she continued walking, past her house and past her neighbour’s prided evergreens. She cleared her mind of all thoughts related to her father and began reciting the Korean vocab as she continued to her safe haven—a place so rusted by time and forgotten by her community that Raina deemed this abandoned playground to be her home away from home. It felt like a place far removed from the rest of the community, a perfect place to recharge her patience. As she tunneled through the narrow dirt path, dodging tree branches on the way, she spotted a little girl in a red rain jacket leaving down a separate dirt path a few feet away. Raina couldn’t see her face with the branches and pine needles situated at eye level. One of the swings was still swaying gently after the little girl left. This was the first time Raina had seen a child come to this abandoned playground in a long while. It had always been a place just for her.

The Toxicity of Words

Raina showed up to her first period Korean class wearing an oversized sweater and yoga pants she’d pulled out from the back of her closet. Her classmates probably saw her as an overly modest, insecure girl from a conservative Asian family. She never received a beating yesterday. She’d just been conditioned to wearing baggy clothes after a night of arguing with her father. Since elementary school, when Raina would wake up with oddly shaped bruises on her arms and legs, her mother would make sure that every purple mark was hidden from plain sight. Raina liked how the loose sleeves were spacious and rarely irritated her scabbed cuts. Because she couldn’t see the Band-Aids underneath her sweater fabric, she could occupy her mind with other things like schoolwork and forget that they were even there.

Don’t roll up your sleeves. If your teachers happen to see them, tell them you got hurt playing at the park, her mother would chide.

Raina always heeded her warnings. She didn’t want to think about what would happen to her if she ever told her teachers the truth, but thankfully, none of her teachers ever noticed and nobody ever asked. In middle school gym class, she was self-conscious about her refusal to wear T-shirts and shorts bearing the school’s emblem like the rest of her peers. She believed that the other students assumed her defiance of the dress code was a call for attention or, worse yet, the