“That’s not fair.”
“Oh, are we talking fair now? Because having the man you’ve been with for years dump you after proposing doesn’t seem too fair.”
“I knew you wouldn’t understand. I need excitement, not a twenty-eight-year-old who has her life mapped out with her own company. Hell, Rach, you have Faith Taylor working with you. You’re never going to get out of here.”
“Well, guess what? You can get out of here. I’m so sorry I have my life settled and figured out.”
“Rach, don’t be like that.”
“Get out, Bradford.” I walked to the door and opened it as wide as I could, motioning for him to leave.
“Maybe after I’ve lived, I’ll feel more ready,” he said, like that would placate me.
Fuck.
Him.
“Please, do not do me any more favors. Now kindly get the fuck out of my sight.”
He grabbed his suitcase and rolled it past me. I refused to look at him. I refused to cry in front of him.
I watched out of my peephole while he waited outside on the sidewalk until his Uber picked him up. He kept looking back at my door, and I wondered if he thought I was going to beg him to take me back.
Actually, I didn’t know what the fuck he was thinking, because the man who just shattered my heart was not the man who’d proposed to me. Bradford had always been the perfect boyfriend. Jules used to joke that he was a serial killer.
Ugh, Jules is going to be pissed when I tell her. She’s who I need. She’s the one I want to fall apart in front of.
On shaky legs I walked to my phone and called Jules. My hands were shaking so bad that it took me three times to unlock my phone.
Her phone went straight to voicemail.
Fuck.
“Hey, uhm, can you give me a call when you get this? Love you.”
After hanging up on her voicemail, I ran to the bathroom and vomited until I was dry heaving. My body shook as my brain played Bradford’s breakup on an endless loop of misery.
Crawling into the shower, I sat on the floor, letting the hot water pound into my broken soul. I sobbed onto my knees. I hadn’t noticed the water going cold until my teeth began to chatter. With the last of my strength, I wrapped my freezing body in my old, tattered robe that Bradford always wanted to replace, but I stubbornly refused because it was one of the first things I’d bought for myself in college. Then I collapsed on my bed. I clutched my phone against my chest after getting Jules’ voicemail again.
Great, her phone must be dead. Just like my soul.
Chapter 12
My hand hurt from holding my phone all night waiting for Jules to call me. Knowing Jules would be on the other line soon kept me grounded.
Where the fuck is Jules?
I contemplated calling my parents, but they were off galivanting around the world, spending my inheritance as my mom loved to say. Honestly, I wasn’t sure they would fly back to help me, and I didn’t want to know the answer. My heart was too tender to take anymore disappointment.
I stared at my ceiling for fuck knew how long. Bradford’s justification on why he needed to end our engagement pinged in my brain. My head hurt, my body hurt, my tattered soul was nonexistent.
After another bout of crying where I dry heaved into the toilet until my stomach ached, I made my way into the kitchen. The unfinished enchilada dinner was still plated on the island.
A scream wrenched out of me, sounding like a wounded animal. I grabbed the plates, throwing them in the garbage, listening to the ceramic shatter.
Join the club.
Everything went into the trash. The enchiladas, the glass container they were in, all the while I was screaming. When everything was gone from that dreaded moment, I stomped outside with the bulging trash bag, tossing it in the bin.