It's Not That I Don't Believe In Love

• Juliette Phan, Grade 9, Wantirna College
• Short Story
• 2015

Excellence Award in the 'The Write Track 2015' competition

It’s not that I don’t believe in love, it’s that when my dad left us, he slammed the door so hard I swear it shook the whole house. He took mum’s heart with him and she’s still breaking her teeth on bottles of alcohol and filling the empty space where her heart used to be with anti-depressants and inhaling cigarettes like it’s the oxygen she needs. Her body is just a shattered mess of cracked ribs and pills and she keeps adding to the destruction.

It’s not that I don’t believe in love, it’s the way my brother cries himself to sleep when he thinks no one can hear him because the girl he loved used him to make her ex jealous. She ripped his heart out and left an empty place in between his ribs which has swallowed him whole. Even though he’s alive, he’s dead inside.

It’s not that I don’t believe in love, it’s all the blood in the bathroom. It’s the night I spent hours in the hospital waiting to see if my sister would live after the boy she was in love with told her he didn’t love her anymore. It’s the crying, the luminous lights, the blinding walls, the pale faces, the shaky breaths and the blood. So much god damn blood.

It’s not that I don’t believe in love, it’s the heartbreak my best friend went through when she found out her boyfriend cheated on her. She cried and shrieked and threw up on my bathroom floor. She let him write his name on her heart in permanent marker but he only let her write hers on his in pencil. I swear to this day I can still see the tear streaks that stain her cheeks.

It’s not that I don’t believe in love, it’s the five weeks we had a substitute in math because our teacher got a divorce and couldn’t handle leaving her bed. I don’t think I’ve seen her smile since she came back. Her hands shake so violently when she talks to the class, you can see that something’s been broken. I got an A in math that year. I think her head was always spinning too hard for her to mark our tests.

It’s not that I don’t believe in love, it’s that I do, and it’s the way I love you more than I love myself.