78 Unbreak My Heart

Don’t leave me in all this pain
Don’t leave me out in the rain
Come back and bring back my smile
Come and take these tears away
I need your arms to hold me now
The nights are so unkind
Bring back those nights when I held you beside me

Un-break my heart
Say you’ll love me again
Undo this hurt you caused
When you walked out the door
And walked out of my life
Un-cry these tears
I cried so many nights
Un-break my heart
My heart

Take back that sad word goodbye
Bring back the joy to my life
Don’t leave me here with these tears
Come and kiss this pain away
I can’t forget the day you left
Time is so unkind
And life is so cruel without you here beside me

Un-break my heart
Say you’ll love me again
Undo this hurt you caused
When you walked out the door
And walked out of my life
Un-cry these tears
I cried so many nights
Un-break my heart

Don’t leave me in all this pain
Don’t leave me out in the rain
Bring back the nights when I held you beside me

Un-break my heart
Say you’ll love me again
Undo this hurt you caused
When you walked out the door
And walked out of my life
Un-cry these tears
I cried so many, many nights
Oh, un-break my

Un-break my heart, oh baby
Come back and say you love me
Un-break my heart, sweet darlin’
Without you I just can’t go on
Can’t go on

Say that you love me, say that you love me
Tell me you love me, un-break my heart
Say that you love me, say that you love me
Tell me you love me, un-break my heart

Maya Fey
Fey Manor
March 9, 2025, 8:45 AM

Staring at her reflection in the bedroom mirror, Maya was shocked. She looked OK, normal even. Inside, the ache for him gnawed at the very heart that still beat endlessly for him. She pulled her lips into a smile, and let out a frightened sob when she realized that anyone could easily mistake this lackluster grin for real happiness. It dumbfounded her.

How can I look so ordinarily normal when I have crumbled inside?

It had been a week now since Phoenix had discarded her like a snotty ball of tissue and the agony still hadn’t lessened. The yearning pang to still be with him echoed through the very marrow of her bones. It was a frosty squall trapped within the hollows of her heart. Time itself seemed to slow to such a leisurely pace that it seemed beyond cruel to Maya, ringing out the seconds, so that the past mere sennight felt more like a month.

I was never locked into my own head when you were here. You remind me of a place where I have never been. You remind me of a recurring dream. No matter how I try, I can never write about you. Some things are too beautiful to verbalize. Some things are too painful.

The Master leaned her forehead against the cool glass, unable to bear another moment of the sorrowful reflection staring back at her, and watched as the tears dripped down onto the mahogany wooden dresser.

Without you, the world goes by like a craptastic film – thrilling in all the wrong ways and crawling in between. It was like we drew the quintessence of one another and combined it in a way that is only meant for the divinities. You were my elixir of life, I was your sunlight. Nothing has meaning anymore, for I am all alone and lost without you. The conventional remedy would be to seek comfort from a friend to salve my inner wounds, but all others left in my life, these elders, can’t compare to the memory of you.  Even the least volatile ones, like Matilda, aren’t friends at all. They’d throw me off the nearest cliff if they believed the rest of the world would approve of the act. There was a time when you’d have moved heaven and earth to save me from harm, no matter what it would cost you, or what anyone else thought. Surely, having my own hero for so long surely spoiled me for all others. You were like a knight in shining armor as well as my prince, and I was your princess. Together we were richer than all the money ever created.

The psychic shut her stinging eyes.

The three of us, you, me, and Pearly, for the longest time, were like a little family. Then Trucy came along, and we could have had it all – not one but now two daughters to love unconditionally. This pair of precious angels already loved one another as blood siblings and would have had two doting parents who loved them, and each other, more than even the air they breathed.

A tear rolled down her cheek.

You shattered that dream, Phoenix Wright. Damn you. Damn you to hell!

Another hope blasted.

But it wasn’t just my heart you broke that night, you cowardly bastard. You got off easy – one last smack to the face and you got off scot-free. You weren’t the one who had to break the news to her…and listen to the sound of her tender heart shattering into a million pieces…

Maya Fey and Pearl Fey
Fey Manor
March 3, 2025, 9:05 AM

Maya would never forget the devastated look on her little girl’s face as she told her the ugly, harsh words.

At first, the teen shook her head violently, as if in denial. Then, eventually, the shock and anguish began to register on her face as she stared into her kinswoman’s woeful gaze.

“No,” the distraught acolyte whispered helplessly, searching for some indication on her cousin’s face that she’d heard her wrong. But there her guardian sat on the bed, silently watching as Pearl remained frozen by the wall of the Master’s bedroom, which she now needed to her trembling hand against. “No, it can’t be true, Mystic Maya, it just can’t!”

“It’s over Pearly.” The diviner’s voice sounded tired and resigned. “Nick doesn’t love me anymore. I don’t think he ever did. H – He wants to be with Iris now.”

The younger Fey stood quite still for several moments then, suddenly lapsed into silence, holding herself in a manner that suggested she’d like to disappear altogether.

Her guardian watched her anxiously.

Although directed in her cousin’s direction, Pearl’s eyes were no longer focusing; they were scanning the room now, locking onto any one thing, almost daydream-like. She shifted her weight from her left to her right and back again every few seconds as if thinking of moving and yet choosing to remain still. A few seconds later, she blinked, as though the full impact of the words had hit her at last, moving backward until her back hit the wall behind her, which she slumped heavily against. A small gasp escaped her as she trembled.

Then her face crumpled, her eyes brimming deeper and deeper with tears until finally, they fell as if they’d never stop, falling thickly to her cherubic lips.

“Why? Why doesn’t Mr. Nick love us anymore? H – He was our family!”

The Kurain head had thought last night her heart had already been through the wringer enough to last a thousand lifetimes. However, seeing the misery that matched what was in her own heart, manifested in those dejected gray eyes, was nearly her undoing.

“I’m sure he still loves you, Pearly,” the village leader soothed, choking back a sob. “And you needn’t cut ties with Trucy over this, either. She’s still your family – and I know you two love one another like sisters…”

“She’s not my sister anymore!” The teenager wailed. “Not if you’re not with her Daddy!”

“Then she can be like your cousin, sweetheart, which is still family, the same way Uncle Scruffy and Aunty Maggey are to both of you girls.” The elder Fey forced herself to smile and rose from the mattress, reaching out to comfort the despondent adolescent. “And Ni – Phoenix can still be your family, Pearly. After all, Iris is your half-sister, so when he marries her…”

She swallowed the bile in her throat that arose at the words.

“…Then he will become your new brother-in-law…”

“I don’t want a brother, Mystic Maya!” Now Pearl was entirely unraveled, and her tears began flowing in a constant stream down her cheeks. “I – I wanted father!”

“Oh Pearly…” Maya reached out a hand to place it on her cousin’s shoulder, but she shrugged it off.

“Leave me alone!” She wept, burying her face in her hands as she turned and fled the room, out the main doors of the manor and outside.

For many long paces, Pearl sprinted, not even thinking of where she was headed. She just had to get away from there. It was silly, she knew. No matter where she went, she could never escape the horrible reality of the situation. And no matter where she went, no matter what she did, there was nowhere she could hide from the thoughts in her head.

At last, the spirit medium stopped to catch her breath in front of the magnificent lake, about a mile away from the mansion grounds and sat down.

Had she not been as forlorn as she sat at the edge of the highland area, she would have been moved by the picturesque beauty of her surroundings. The sight of the snowcapped mountaintop behind it was perfectly reflected in the water below. It looked like a massive rock extending down into the lake and up to the cloudy skies. The edges of the image were a little rippled where the wind blew on the water and the colors had an azureous hue.

Pearl pulled her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arms around her shins.

If I could just curl up into a ball, I wouldn’t have to face real life, I’d be protected from everything around me. She laughed bitterly.  But I’d still have to live with myself, with the wretched memories swirling around in my mind.

Her eyes, already red and puffy from crying, squeezed shut to push more tears out. She let her head fall to her knees and pulled her legs closer to her.

Any moments of happiness and joy Pearl Fey had ever known in her otherwise tragic young life, were associated with Maya and Phoenix Wright. The loving affection she’d gotten the last seven years from the latter, coupled with the maternal love of her cousin had mostly made up for having a faceless, unknown father. Or the gut-wrenching betrayal and knowledge that she’d had a scheming, overly ambitious, murderess-in-training for a mother. One who had never truly loved her, but only seen her as a pawn in her insatiable thirst for power.

Mr. Nick didn’t just break up with Mystic Maya. He’s broken up with both of us. But … Why? What have we ever done? What did I ever do? I -I loved him so much! I had so many cherished memories with him!

The most beautiful of remembrances were the worst, cutting her insides as if they were shards of glass.

June 2017

The bright-eyed 8-year-old peered up shyly at the tall man with spiky hair and gentle eyes, smiling bashfully.

“To tell you the truth, I really want to grow my hair out, just like Mystic Maya,” she told him.  “But my mother wouldn’t let me.”

The child couldn’t fathom why her mother wouldn’t want her to have hair as long and beautiful as Mystic Maya’s any more than she could understand why Morgan was so mean to her cousin most of the time.

Phoenix smiled warmly. “I think your hair now suits you perfectly.”

“R-Really?” Pearl felt her cheeks turning pink with pleasure. “Th –Thank you!” 

What a nice thing to say! Mystic Maya’s Special Someone sure is a nice man! What a lucky girl she is!

November 2017

“This is so much fun!” Pearl crowded as she bounced on Phoenix’s back.

“You know you’re spoiling her, Nick, giving her piggyback rides all the time like that whenever she says she’s too tired,” Maya mock admonished, even though she was grinning. “Put her down! She’s old enough to walk!”

“She’s as light as a feather,” the lawyer dismissed airily. “After all, she spent all day walking around on those little legs looking at lions and tigers and bears, ohhh myyyy!”

The spirit medium laughed and punched him on the shoulder.

“You’re such a dork, Nick!”

“Besides, this Old Man needs some exercise!” Phoenix chuckled. “But since I’m carrying the weight for two, that also means I get your share of ice cream, right Pearls?”

“No!” The girl squealed delightedly. “I want ice cream, too!”

“You expect me to carry you and buy you ice cream?” He teased. “You sure drive a hard bargain! It must run in the family! I pay your my so-called assistant here to essentially play Steel Samurai games online when she should be working…”

“I do not!” Maya denied hotly, then blushed when he raised an eyebrow at her. “Well, maybe sometimes, when we have downtime! But definitely not all the time…”

“The things your cousin does when she thinks I’m not looking,” Phoenix confided to Pearl in a stage whisper. “She goofs off on my dime and still makes me buy her burgers all the time! Cuz she knows I’m just a big softie who can’t say no to either of you Fey girls!”

The child let out a peal of laughter, the sound like an auditory hug that warmed both their hearts with its silvery sound. It journeyed its way through the wintry air, encasing even passersby with its warm embrace. Even the most stoical of the travelers walking past them barely suppressed their grins. Beneath a sky that only promised icy rain and with a stressful day ahead that threatened to stretch into infinity before nightfall, that childish eruption of pure glee was the gift they didn’t know they’d needed.

“She laughs at me!” He joked. “But that’s because Pearls knows full well that she’s got me wrapped around her little finger!”

The little girl just giggled but denied nothing.

Maya regarded him with a soft smile playing on her lips.

“You are so great with kids, Nick.”

“Pearls makes it easy!” The attorney declared. “If I ever have a daughter, Pearls, I want her to be just like you!”

The moppet smiled shyly and ducked her chin. She’d never felt more lighthearted and happy in her life.

You’re wonderful, Mr. Nick, she thought blissfully. I wish you could be my real Daddy.

April 18, 2019

When Pearl woke up and came to the breakfast table the morning after her cousin’s birthday party, both she and Phoenix treated her to co-conspirator grins.

“Pearly…” Maya smilingly nuzzled into the spiky-haired man’s side as he wrapped an arm around her slender shoulders. “Nick and I have something we want to tell you.”

“I think you’re going to be pretty happy with the news,” Phoenix added mysteriously.

Pearl felt like every fiber of her being was vibrating with anticipation. Adrenaline was coursing through her veins. Her hands trembled and her eyes were wide. 

This is what a cat must feel like waiting to pounce on a mouse!

“What is it? Tell me, tell me, tell me!” She begged, bouncing on her heels. “Pretty please with a bunch of sugar on top!”

“Pearls,” Phoenix smiled lovingly at the elder Fey, then at her. “You’ve been right all along. Maya and I, as of last night… are officially Special Someones.”

Her cousin reached down to pull out a beautiful heart-shaped locket from under her oversized nightshirt (actually, one of her new boyfriend’s shirts, which she’d worn as an impromptu nightie) and showed Pearl the picture of Mia on one side, and the three of them on the other.

“Everyone I love, all together in one place,” Maya whispered, leaning over and kissing Phoenix on the cheek. “I’ll never take this off.”

Pearl squealed with delight and pressed her hands against her cheeks, her eyes shining. She felt as though the sky had just filled up with rainbows made of jellybeans!

Mr. Nick and Mystic Maya were finally admitting they were in love! Now they could all be a real family! That meant maybe someday, Mr. Nick would adopt her to be his daughter!

“I knew it! I always knew!” Pearl shouted gleefully. “Even when you two kept saying no and told me I was wrong, I always knew you two loved each other all along!”

Then she delightedly ran up to the couple and threw her tiny arms around both of them.

The three of them had a big family hug then. Pearl beamed blissfully at the man she’d grown to so adore the past couple of years as a father figure.  She’d never seen her cousin so happy, and she knew the big smile on her own face was mirrored by all three of them.

This is even better than when we all went to Gatewater Land and I met the Blue Badger! Pearl was positively giddy with glee. Today is the happiest day of my whole life!

September 5, 2020

“Trucy knows I had an assistant before, so there’s no need to hide the fact that you’re Maya’s cousin.” Phoenix gently put a finger under her chin and tilted up her downcast face so she could see his affectionate expression. “Or the fact that I love you just as much as I do Trucy. As if you were my own daughter too, Pearls.”

Hearing those poignant words from the only father figure she’d ever known, at a point in her life when she’d never before felt more scared and alone, Pearl felt a wave of emotion wash over her just then. With a wordless cry and tears welling up in her eyes, she lurched forward to wrap her arms around Phoenix for one last hug before he had to go.

“I love you too, Mr. Nick,” she whispered. “I really, really, do.”

“Pearly,” Maya’s voice sounded softly in her ear just then.

The spirit medium looked up, startled, and saw that raindrops had begun to fall from the sky, soaking the ground beneath her. Her parental figure stood there, an umbrella in her hand, and a sad, but loving, expression in her eyes.

“Pearly, you’ll get sick out here in the rain.” Maya crouched down next to her on the dampened grass and leaned forward, wrapping an arm around her and holding the umbrella over both their heads. “Please, come back inside with me.”

The girl looked into her guardian’s compassionate orbs with her own woeful, watery ones, and nodded mutely.

“It’s OK to be sad, Pearly,” the Master told her gently. “I’m sad, too. But we’ll get through this, together. You and me, we’ll be one another’s shoulder to cry on. Just no more crying by yourself in the rain, sweet girl. Never feel as though you’ve got no one. I swear to you, you will never be unloved, or alone, as long as there is breath in my body.”

She pulled the morose girl into her arms then.

“I love you so much, Pearl Fey. You’re my life; my everything.”

Pearl opened her mouth to speak, to say she felt the same way about her caregiver. That she was sorry she’d run out on her only family, who was hurting just as bad, if not worse than she was. She tried to find the words to convey it was likewise; that Mystic Maya meant the whole world to her.

But the words came out fitfully, the sounds half-swallowed by a sobbing noise. To her dismay, she was crying almost too much to be coherent, and her sobbing form fell into her cousin’s comforting embrace then, her tears not even masked by the rain.

Maya Fey
Fey Manor
March 9, 2025, 8:55 am

You said you loved me and I took you at your word. You said I was your soul mate and over the years you became part of the bedrock of my personality. Then one day, out of the blue, under a dark, moonlit sky, you announced you were in love with someone else.

With every spare moment, her mind would rehearse a new call or letter to him, but the small remaining shred of her sanity and her dignity, wouldn’t allow her. Besides, she knew it was ultimately for naught if she did. He had made his choice agonizingly, crystal clear that night.

Of all the women in the world, you hath forsaken me for my own cousin. Iris. It would have been kinder to kill me. Now I must be this person filled with a feeling of sorrow and emptiness that I can’t control. She is to be the mother of your future children, you want Trucy to call her “mommy.” You never spared even a second thought about what this would do to my darling Pearly, how this would affect her, did you? She loved you as much as I did, you sonofabitch!

Maya clenched her hands into fists so tight, her nails tore into her palms.

What about my little girl’s loss? She saw you as her father. Seeing the heartache of a child that you love as your own surpasses any kind of hurt or pain that you can ever feel for yourself. It takes all my pitiful sadness… and replaces it with bitterness and hate.

The psychic glared at her reflection in the mirror, watching the mournful eyes harden in appearance. As she recalled the betrayal and suffering she’d seen in her beloved Pearl’s face upon hearing the news, it only strengthened her resolve and hardened her heart.

I wish I hadn’t stopped with one slap. I wish I could have hit your unbreakable ass with enough force to make you feel even a fraction of the pain you’ve caused me, caused us both, and just as easily as I did that night, I’d still have walked away without shedding a goddamn tear, not one. The girl you met nearly ten years ago, the one with the big eyes and the bigger heart is now consumed by a hatred she never knew could take root. But here it is. Here we are. I am yesterday’s news and she is the new belle of the ball. You wrap your arm around her waist, proudly showing off who your heart belongs to now, while I am forced to keep calm and carry on and smile through the pain as I always have, I am sick of it. Sickened that you’ve made me need to do this. I hate you, Phoenix Wright. The hate doesn’t ebb, it multiplies.

Without another moment’s hesitation, Maya reached for her cell phone and called Tyler’s wife, Sasha.

Maya Fey
Fey Manor, Master Bedroom
March 9, 2025, 1:00 PM

“Thanks for squeezing me in, Sasha, especially on such short notice,” the Master smiled gratefully. “I hope this won’t take too long – you’re picking up Kaya and Petra from school this afternoon?”

“It’s fine, Tyler doesn’t start work till six, and I’ve budgeted enough travel time to be back long before then. It’s raining out there, so there’s no way I’m going to be driving like a madwoman to the city during breakneck speed if there’s rush hour,” the hairdresser replied. “I don’t normally make house calls – especially this far from LA, but for an old friend, I don’t mind making an exception.”

“I’ll make it worth your while, including paying your gas and mileage,” Maya promised. “I – I just couldn’t face going down to the city just yet, which is why I didn’t just come down to see you myself at your home salon.”

“Do you have a pressing upcoming engagement?” Her friend asked. “You sounded so frantic and desperate on the phone I didn’t even try to make you wait till you were in a more rational state of mind, or even hold off until your next trip down to the city.”

“I’m not sure when I will ever go back to Los Angeles, Sasha. Or if I ever will again.”

Sasha’s pretty face looked puzzled, but she opted not to pry. That was one of the tricks of the trade she’d learned. Clients loved to confide and talk, but never push them. They would open up whenever they were ready.

“You sure you want to do this, love?” She asked doubtfully, draping the smock around the spirit medium. “I mean, this is a most drastic move, and shouldn’t be made rashly. Why don’t you just go for wild hair color, like mine?”

Maya looked at the Amazon’s now electric coral, shoulder-length waves, with the bright blue streak running down the left side of her face, accentuating her blue eyes, and smiled. Few people could pull off the look, but the porcelain-skinned British woman certainly had the panache to do so.

For a brief moment, she allowed herself to entertain the notion, imagining the looks of scandalized horror of the elders and business associates if the esteemed Master of Kurain were to show up with a rainbow-hued hair ‘do. Mildew herself would have a complete conniption, if not an outright heart attack!

Oh…that would be reason enough! I. Am. So. Tempted…

“No, stick with the original plan, Sasha,” she replied at last. “No coloring.”

Maya’s mind flashed back to the gut-wrenching memory of holding her heartbroken, weeping cousin in her arms a week ago.

“W-what does M-Miss Iris have that you don’t, Mystic Maya?” Pearl had sobbed piteously. “He told me he loved everything about you! You’re fun! You’re smart! You’re beautiful! He said he loved you from head to toe and that you were perfect in every way, and he wouldn’t have changed even a single strand of hair on your head!”

Her hair. Her long, silken, signature raven head of hair…

“I just don’t want you to have any regrets in the morning,” Sasha murmured uneasily. “I mean, I am still kind of shocked that five years since I made the offer, you’re taking me up on it now! Are you sure your boyfriend won’t come after me? He nearly bit my head off when I even mentioned it, remember?”

Of course, the diviner remembered. She remembered everything. She remembered endless moments of bliss while Phoenix lovingly stroked the lengthy, fragrant tresses, which tumbled past her buttocks – he’d liked playfully tweaking it at times, even before they’d gotten together. And she could hardly forget all the times he’d twirled the satiny locks around his fingers and run his hands through them. Not to mention the countless instances of erotically tugging it during their wild, passionate lovemaking sessions…

Phoenix had loved her hair.

“Nick’s not my boyfriend anymore – he dropped me like a hot potato, completely out of the blue,” the Kurain head replied abruptly, in a tone that left no room for further discussion. “Therefore, I couldn’t give a rat’s ass what he thinks!”

“He’s not?” Sasha looked horrified. “Since when?! He hasn’t mentioned a word to Tyler or me! That ass! What did he do to you?!”

The woman’s posh Cambridge accent made the word sound like ahsss, which under different circumstances, Maya would have tittered about.

But she was in no laughing mood right now. There was a song, she was sure, about “washing that man right out of my hair.”

Well, as of today, Maya Fey was going to symbolically cut Phoenix Wright right out of her hair and life, just as easily and readily as he’d cut himself from hers.

“It doesn’t matter,” Maya answered hollowly, clenching her jaw. “What’s important is this. Hack away, Sasha. Donate it to charity, cancer wigs, whatever. But take it off. Right here, right now.”

Sometime later…

“All done,” the Englishwoman declared, removing the cape with a flourish and biting her lip as she handed her client the hand mirror. “What do you think?”

Maya gulped. It was so… different. But she didn’t hate it. And after all, it would grow back, right?

She nodded bravely.

“I trusted you. And I don’t regret my decision.” Reaching into her bag, she handed the hairdresser a very generous monetary sum for all her efforts and then proceeded to walk her out the door of the manor, to the main village gate, where Sasha gave her one last hug, made Maya swear she’d call if she ever needed anything or just wanted to talk, then got into her car and left.

The village leader already had her phone to her ear as she called Sister Bikini at Hazakura temple.

“Sister, I need to speak to Mystic Mildred.” Her tone was brusque, as she was in no mood for chit-chat.

“Ho-ho, all business today I hear,” the jovial nun gave her customary booming laugh. “But she’s busy right now, as she’s out digging a new latrine as we speak.  Remember, you told her you wanted a new dug-out for a few additional outhouses since tourist season for cabin rentals is around the corner?”

“Fine, then please relay a message for me,” the Master said curtly.

“Certainly,” Bikini replied pleasantly. “What is it?”

“Just tell her this: I changed my mind. She’ll know what it means.”

Toni Braxton – Unbreak My HeartToni Braxton – Unbreak My Heart