Chapter 27 Glass Houses
Glass Houses
WYNTER’S POV
I was nine the night the glass shattered, but some nights, it feels like something deep inside of me never stopped breaking.
That chilling crystalline crash—still echoes in the back of my mind, catching on memories I wish I could forget.
Mum and appa were arguing again. Their harsh bitter words swirled and ricocheted off the walls, filling the house with a tension so thick I felt suffocated. They were like that all the time lately, didn’t see eye to eye.
My mother Galaine Thomas was a certain kind of person who crumbled in what she perceived as captivity.
She wasn’t the kind of woman you could ever tie down, at the end of the day she would do as she pleased damn the consequences.
She was an overachiever, graduated with honours and was in search of someone as intelligent as she was to settle down with.
And then she met my father and according to her it was love at first convenience.
He was there, he was sharp, and witty and kept her on her toes.
He was everything she was told she should want for herself.
And so she had a white wedding, the home magazine cover-worthy marriage and the four kids she’d intended. According to her it was the perfect number for one to look after the other.
She wore motherhood like a pair of boots she knew would never fit but attempted to break into nevertheless because she’d paid a lot for them, shoes crafted with expectations she never agreed to.
The four of us were not so much her children as we were her anchors, heavy and unrelenting, dragging her into waters she never wanted to tread.
Freedom was the horizon she could never reach, no matter how many trips she took or how far she ran.
We could see it in her eyes—a bird pacing the confines of a gilded cage, her wings itching for the skies, her songs too distant for us to understand.
To her, true love or at least love of oneself was not in the staying but in the leaving, a bolter to her core. She never lingered.
Motherhood was her curse never her blessing.
Her voice was angry, always angry. Appa’s was thunderous, heavy with years of resentment.
“You don’t want to raise him— no what you want is freedom!” Dad’s voice cracked like a whip, raw and accusing.
“That’s not true!” Mum quipped, “Do you want him to waste away the talent I gave him? He’s special, and you’d rather see him buried under mediocrity like you are, I won’t have that for my son!”
Mediocrity. Ordinary. Those were her favourite weapons, and she used them mercilessly as if anything less than brilliance was a betrayal of who she believed we should be.
But I was just a kid, and all I needed was her attention—a soft touch, a word of praise, something to make me feel she was proud of me for who I was rather than what I could do.
But Mum was a phantom in her own house, a whisper of scent drifting down the corridor, a name on postcards from countries we'd never been. She liked the concept of us, I believe, but not the actuality. Her wings could not bear the weight of four children. She was constantly absent.
I don’t know why I stepped into the room that night. Maybe I thought I could stop it, like I could freeze their anger with my voice.
“Please stop fighting,” I said, small and trembling, the words barely carrying over the storm of their argument. “Bae doesn’t understand and Mummy I don’t eithe-”
She turned sharply as if she’d forgotten I existed. Her hand flew back—not aimed at me, just an impulsive motion—but it caught my shoulder. I stumbled, my foot catching the edge of the rug, and then gravity betrayed me.
The fall was slow and fast all at once, the kind of moment that stretches and snaps in a breath. I hit the glass table, and it shattered beneath me, the shards biting into my arm like teeth. For a moment, the world stopped.
Then came the sound of my father’s voice, hollowed by panic. “Wynter!”
I heard Beck before I saw her, her footsteps pounding down the stairs like a war drum. She froze when she reached the room, her wide eyes darting between me, the blood pooling beneath my elbow, and Mom.
“What did you do?” she whispered, her voice trembling with rage. Then she snapped.
“Don’t you dare touch him again!” Beck’s voice cut through the silence like a blade, fierce and unyielding. I had never seen her like that—her face flushed, her fists clenched, her whole body vibrating with fury. She looked like a lioness ready to tear someone apart.
Mum reached for me, her hands shaking. “Wynter, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean—”
“Enough,” Dad’s voice came low and cold, silencing her. He knelt beside me, his hands steady as he checked the wound. “You’ve never been a mother to them. You only care about yourself.”
She tried to speak, but her words crumbled into sobs, her tears falling faster than she could catch them. She looked so small in that moment, like she was shrinking beneath the weight of her guilt.
“Pack your things,” appa said, his voice flat, empty. “Go. You can’t stay here.”
She cried harder, but she didn’t argue. She didn’t fight for us.
Beck cleaned up the glass while Dad carried me to the car. The hospital was cold and bright, the sting of the stitches a dull ache compared to the heaviness in my chest. It was then that I knew that my sister would always protect me, that perhaps she always had.
Beck and I, we had this silent understanding of sorts you see, I protect you, you protect them. She would look after me, and in turn I would watch over Bae and Jiwon, and appa well he would do his best to fill the gap left by our mother and carry us all on his own.
That was the last night she lived with us.
I got stitches on my elbow and a scar that still catches the light when I skate. Sometimes, when I look at it, I think about how fragile things are—glass, family, love. And how easily they can shatter.
Flashback summer 13”
Wynter 15, Cahya, 15
The first time Cahya noticed the scar on my elbow, we were sitting in the corner booth at Trudy’s Diner, the one with the peeling red vinyl seats that stuck to your legs on hot days.
Outside, the summer sun was melting over Waverly Peak, painting the mountains gold.
Inside, the smell of fries and vanilla milkshakes wrapped around us like a warm blanket.
We’d just finished splitting a plate of fries when Cahya’s eyes flicked to my arm. I’d pushed up my sleeves to escape the heat, and the scar was there, pale and thin against my skin.
“What’s that?” he asked, pointing at it like it was the most interesting thing he’d seen all day.
I froze, my hand halfway to my milkshake. “It’s nothing,” I said quickly, looking down at the scar. “I just… fell. A long time ago.”
Cahya tilted his head, his dark eyes narrowing like he didn’t believe me. “It doesn’t look like nothing. Did something bad happen to you?”
His voice was softer now, careful, like he thought I might break if he pressed too hard. I swallowed, the memory of that night flashing through my mind—the glass shattering, the sharp sting, my dad’s voice, Beck’s face. I didn’t want to talk about it.
But before I could say anything, Cahya grinned. “Wait! I know what it is—it’s a battle scar!”
“A… what?” I said, confused.
“A battle scar!” he repeated, bouncing in his seat. “Like from a fight. You’re, like, a superhero or something! All the best heroes have scars, you know. It’s, like, part of their origin story.”
I couldn’t help but laugh. “It’s not a battle scar. I tripped and fell on a table.”
“That’s even better,” he said, digging into his backpack. “You fell into danger! And then you survived. That’s what makes it cool.”
He pulled out a handful of markers—mostly black and blue, a few red—and unscrewed the cap of one with his teeth. “Hold still,” he said around the marker, leaning across the table.
“What are you doing?” I asked, pulling my arm back.
“Making you a superhero, duh,” he said like it was obvious. “Don’t worry, I’m, like, an amazing artist. Trudy won’t care if we take a while.”
I sighed but rested my arm on the table, letting him go to work. Cahya leaned in, his tongue sticking out as he drew big, wobbly lightning bolts around the scar. Then he added a star, a shield, and what I think were flames, but they looked more like squiggles.
“There!” he said, sitting back to admire his work. “You’re Super Wynter! The Ice God! You can fly, fight bad guys with ice blocks, and… uh, maybe shoot lasers from your eyes. Yeah, definitely lasers.”
I looked down at the mess of colors on my arm and felt something shift in my chest. The scar didn’t look so sharp anymore, didn’t feel like a weight I had to carry. It felt like a story, a part of me that wasn’t so scary now.
“You think superheroes have scars?” I asked, glancing at him.
“Of course they do,” Cahya said. “The coolest ones, anyway. And we’re gonna be best friends forever, so don’t forget me when you’re famous.” He held out his pinky, his face serious.
I hesitated, then hooked my pinky around his. “Best friends forever,” I promised.
For the rest of the day, I didn’t hide my arm. Even when we walked out of Trudy’s and the markers started to smudge in the heat, I kept it in the sun. Somehow, it didn’t feel like a scar anymore. It felt like something brave.
PRESENT DAY
Wynters POV
I asked Cahya to meet me at Willows, a little cafe down the street to talk.
ME: Hi can we talk, are you busy?
CAHYA: ……
ME: ???
CAHYA: What did I do this time. I am innocent!
ME: You didn’t do anything, unfortunately, this time it’s all me. Meet me at willows?
CAHYA: But it’s raining.
ME: Bring a jacket??? Maybe?? Crazy idea I know.
CAHYA: Fine, but if this is how I go down and end up in one of those serial killer documentaries, I will never forgive you.