A HEART TOO TENDER (Sydney POV
1425 Words
The moment I stepped out of Drake’s private elevator and into the cold December dawn, the city felt… louder.
Sharper.
Like every honk, every rushing footstep, every swirl of icy wind was determined to remind me that somewhere between the glittering ballroom and that elevator ride, my heart had been cracked open...twice.
By betrayal.
And by the possibility of something I shouldn’t even be thinking about.
I hugged my coat tighter around me as I walked toward the Cradle Heart Foundation’s glass doors. The building glowed warm from inside, like a tiny safe haven refusing to surrender to winter. My safe haven. The one place where miracles still felt real.
Ironically, the woman who spent every day giving hope to abandoned children was the one who could barely hold herself together.
The moment the doors slid open, the smell of hot chocolate and cinnamon hit me...Alina’s doing. I forced my lips into what I hoped passed as a smile.
“Good morning, Miss Walters!” a volunteer chirped.
“Morning,” I said softly, praying my voice didn’t wobble.
I walked deeper into the hallway. Children’s laughter chimed from the playroom, bright and innocent. It carved a painful contrast in my chest...like the universe was reminding me that life could still be good even when it felt like it was falling apart.
Or maybe the universe was just taunting me.
When I stepped inside the playroom, three little heads immediately turned my way.
“Miss Syd!”
“Teacher Syd, look at my tree drawing!”
“You came back!”
Their tiny hands reached for me like I was strength and comfort wrapped in human form.
If only they knew how empty I felt.
I knelt down, hugging them tightly. Too tightly.
Children always know when something is wrong.
And these kids...kids who had lost families, stability, warmth...were especially attuned to emotion. They could sense the earthquake inside me no matter how pretty I tried to paint the surface.
“Miss Syd…”
Small brown eyes blinked up at me.
“Why are you… sad?”
My throat burned.
“Oh, sweetheart,” I whispered, brushing a curl from her forehead. “Miss Syd’s just tired. Christmas preparations, you know?”
The lie tasted like metal.
But what was I supposed to say?
That the man I loved for seven years shattered me like glass behind velvet curtains while a woman with red lipstick smirked at my destruction?
That a stranger, the one whose touch felt like warmth I’d never known,now held me together better than the man who promised me forever?
No child deserved to hear that.
“No sad Christmas, okay?” the little girl whispered, touching my cheek. “We make it happy.”
My heart cracked a little more.
“I’ll try,” I whispered back.
But of course, Alina notices.
I didn’t last ten minutes before Alina stormed into my office like a caffeine-fueled hurricane.
“Sit.”
She pointed at my chair.
Not requested.
Not suggested.
Commanded.
I opened my mouth to argue—I really thought I could pull off the façade—but the second her eyes scanned my face, I saw it.
Her whole expression softened.
“Oh my God… Syd.”
And just like that, the glass walls I’d been holding up shattered.
“Ali ..please don’t,” I breathed, shaking my head.
But she crossed the room in two strides and wrapped her arms around me.
The moment her warmth hit me, everything I’d been holding in—the humiliation, the heartbreak, the betrayal, the confusion from Drake—came crashing out of me like a dam exploding.
One second I was stiff, fighting it.
The next, I was collapsing into her chest, crying with the kind of pain that lives in the bones.
Alina rubbed circles on my back.
“It’s okay,” she murmured. “Cry, Syd. God, you’ve been carrying everything alone again.”
I hated that she knew me this well.
I hated that she was right.
I hated that Marcus took seven years of my loyalty and ruined it in seven seconds.
My voice cracked as I tried to speak.
“I saw him… kissing her.”
Alina’s grip tightened.
“That son of a—okay. No. No, keep crying. I’ll curse him later.”
A choked laugh escaped me.
A weak one.
But still a laugh.
It felt wrong to laugh and break at the same time, but every emotion inside me was tangled, messy, bleeding.
“I loved him, Ali,” I whispered. “I thought he was the one. I...God, I really believed he was my miracle.”
Alina pulled back and cupped my face gently.
“Syd, listen to me.”
Her voice was steady, firm, full of that no-nonsense tone she only used when I refused to listen.
“He is not your miracle. He’s a lesson. A brutal one. But still a lesson.”
A tear slid down my cheek.
“I don’t know how to move on from this.”
“You don’t have to know today,” she said softly. “But you do need to let him go. For your heart’s sake. For your future’s sake.”
My chest ached.
Let him go.
Three simple words.
Three impossible actions.
Because heartbreak wasn’t just losing love... it was losing the version of yourself that lived for that love.
Alina sat on the edge of the desk, crossing her arms.
“You’re one of the strongest women I know,” she said. “But even strong women can crumble. And you know what that means?”
“What?” I whispered.
“It means you get to rebuild. And maybe… you’ll rebuild into something even better.”
I swallowed hard.
Her words were supposed to bring comfort.
But they terrified me.
Because rebuilding meant starting over.
Starting over meant facing the unknown.
And facing the unknown meant...
A flash of storm-gray eyes crashed into my mind.
Drake.
His voice like steady thunder.
His gaze like a storm wrapped around a promise.
That strange warmth on my skin when he touched me.
Like my heart recognized something before my mind could understand it.
I flinched.
Alina saw it instantly.
“Okay,” she said slowly. “There’s more. You’re hiding something.”
“No, it’s just...”
“Sydney Walters.”
She leaned in, narrowing her eyes.
“You have a tell. You bite your lip when you’re lying.”
Damn it.
I bit my lip harder.
Her jaw dropped.
“Oh my God. There IS something else!”
I groaned, covering my face with both hands.
“Ali, it’s nothing. It’s just—someone helped me last night. After… everything.”
“A bystander? A security guy? A kind stranger?”
“…”
Silence.
Her eyes widened.
“Wait. Was he hot?”
“Ali...”
“Oh my GOD HE WAS HOT! SYDNEY...ARE YOU KIDDING ME...”
“It’s not like that,” I snapped, cheeks burning. “I was crying! I was a mess!”
“And he still…” She froze. “He still stayed with you?”
I nodded.
The room fell quiet.
Not judgmental quiet.
Concerned quiet.
“Syd,” she whispered, “that’s not nothing.”
I stared down at my trembling hands.
“I don’t even know why I’m thinking about him,” I whispered. “I shouldn’t be. I just… he made me feel safe for a few minutes. And then I remembered I’m supposed to be heartbroken and running away from an ego-crushing humiliation.”
Alina sighed, brushing my hair back gently.
“You’re not thinking about him because you want a rebound. You’re thinking about him because your soul is desperately looking for something to remind it that you’re worth more than being someone’s second choice.”
My breath hitched.
“I shouldn’t feel anything,” I whispered.
“You’re human, Syd. Not a robot.”
But what I felt wasn’t normal.
It wasn’t basic reaction.
It was something deeper.
Warmer.
Scary.
Something that felt like destiny had brushed against my skin in the form of a stranger with storm-gray eyes.
I shivered.
Alina leaned forward, locking eyes with me.
“Sydney,” she said softly. “Let Marcus go.”
I looked away.
And almost instantly...
like my heart didn’t know who it was supposed to be beating for anymore...
I saw Drake’s shadow again behind my eyelids.
And this time…
it didn’t feel scary.
It felt inevitable.
- Writer
