• It was glass. All of the others were too, but most had little protective cases. Hers didn’t. Hers was a little thin clear thing. Missing a few pieces, and cracked.

    She’d been told that it was golden, was red. Was opaque. Then someone told her they were all thin little pieces of glass. Clear as water. Reflective, too. She didn’t believe it. She didn’t want to.

    But it was true. She could see it. She held it in her hands, staring in awe at the thing’s painful, broken beauty. Her heart.