Instruction Manual: Repairing a Broken Heart

1.0 Introduction

Following rupture, the heart will enter a state of melancholia:

a dimming in the chest cavity,

a static flatline where warmth used to reside,

a persistent tremor mistaken for memory.

This manual has been prepared for the operator who discovers this critical fault. Proceed slowly; broken systems resist sudden sensitivity.

2.0 Safety Warnings

All recollections should be handled with insulated thought; even distant memories retain heat subconsciously.

Avoid direct inhalation of familiar names and faces.

They disperse unevenly and cause internal collapse.

Rooms where affection was sought should be entered only after the room has been sterilised.

If the heart shuts down, do not attempt forceful override.

Most mechanisms are delicate after being tampered with.

Bleeding of feeling is natural.

Severe clarity is rare and should not be trusted.

3.0 Procedure

To begin, listen for the faint fault line,

the ache beneath the machinery.

Extricate the lingering fibres of wishful hope with steady hands—

they tend to cling to the falsely conceived notion of feeling nothing.

Rinse the inner chamber with distance,

allow it to settle at its own pace.

Broken things prefer darkness before they reshape themselves.

Reassembly is approximate.

Edges will reject their previous alignment.

Treat this not as a failure of the unit,

but as proof that it can operate under hostile conditions.

4.0 Aftercare

In the following days, expect irregular rhythms:

the heart remembers in pulses,

forgetting only in fragments.

Do not scrutinise recovery.

Main functions will return only when unobserved.

If tenderness resurfaces without warning,

let it pass through the system.

Not all signals require a response.

With time, the heart will quiet.

Not to its former settings—

but to something serviceable,

steady enough to carry you forward.