To Forgive by Dawn Felagund

Broken

Maitimo learns from his baby brother about loss, pride, and forgiveness. A quadrabble (400 words).

II. Broken--Maitimo
A crash from upstairs rouses me from my book. It takes a moment for my eyes--my mind--to become adjusted again to sight of this world. How long have I been studying? The sand in the hourglass has long expired.

On feet numbed and legs cramped from sitting, I hobble up the stairs in the direction of the noise. I listen for sobs: nothing. The silence is thick and guilty. My heart pounding in my chest is all that I hear.

Dust swirls in the wedge of light pouring from my partly opened bedroom door. I hasten toward it and round the corner, pushing it open all of the way.

Curufinwë: he sits on my bedroom floor in a patch of light from the window. Around him are one thousand shards of colored glass, a rainbow shattered upon my bedroom floor. With small, trembling hands, he is trying to fit them back together.

His eyes fly open wide at the sight of me.

My mouth hangs open slightly. What have you done?--the accusation waits on the edge of my tongue to be loosed at my baby brother trying to put together the stained glass project--the only project I have ever done that made my father exclaim with wonder--with chubby, bleeding fingers. I have told you. I have told you one thousand times not to--

"The light through it, I liked, I wanted to see--" he stammers.

I should shout and rage; I have every right. I should demand that Atar punish him; this, too, is my right. I should make certain that the tears shining in his eyes soak his face and make him understand the pain I feel at what he has done.

But with stiff legs that want to resist, I go to him. With hands that want to clench into fists, I lift him from the mess he has made. With lips that want to tremble with unshed tears at the beauty--my single triumph--lost, I force myself to smile.

"Hush. Let us clean and bandage these cuts."

I hold his head to my chest as we walk so that he does not see the pain I feel at swallowing anger and grief. But my stained glass would have become bent and worn and dulled with time, if not eventually broken. But my brother--he will be mine to keep forever.