Page 215 of Tangled with the Tight End

“Was that such a good idea?” I ask her. “I’m going to be here, alone, moping all week.”

“You are free to do whatever you need to do. Now you have no obligations. So if you need to curl up with a pillow and cry your eyes out, you can. If you want to bundle up and take a walk, do that. Just wear sunglasses so they don’t get you on film.”

“Uggghhh.” I growl out a loud sound that feels so good I do it again. “Uhhhhgggghhhhh!”

Then I collapse. I’m so wiped out, Cass has to walk me upstairs, make me brush my teeth and tuck me in.

“Thanks,” I tell her when she flips the light out.

“I’m right across the hall. Wake me if you need me.”

“Hopefully I’m going to sleep for a really, really long time—like, all week.”

She doesn’t say anything. Doesn’t talk me out of my sadness.

She just says, “I love you, Win.”

“I love you too. You are my person.”

She shuts the door and I allow more tears, soft ones that trickle out and fall onto my pillow.

Declan was my person.

He still is.

A man doesn’t stop being your person just because he tells you he has to break up with you.

He’s my person.

That’s why this hurts so much.

I spend the next few days sequestered at home. I don’t shower. I barely eat. I lay on the couch staring out the front window.

Reporters show up on day three. When there’s no sign of me leaving the house, they go away. Cass makes me shower that afternoon.

“You stink,” she says. “And I say that in love. You can wallow. But you can wallow with clean hair and a fresh set of pajamas.”

By day four, heartbreak feels like my new personality.

My friends stop by. They called me and I didn’t answer, so they called Cass and she told them what happened. Daisy said she knew, because Declan told Patrick. She was just giving me space until Sydney decided they needed to bring me pastries and coffee.

I don’t even change into clothes when they show up.

We’re all sitting around the living room.

“How are you?” Emberleigh asks.

“Don’t ask her that,” Sydney says, smiling shyly at me.

“It’s fine. You can ask. I’m just really sad.”

Everyone’s quiet for a beat.

“Please don’t tiptoe around me,” I say. “I’m sure life will resume in time … Next week, actually.”

“Take your time,” Daisy says, smiling softly.

“Pastries help,” Emberleigh says.