Confessions of a Broken Heart

Chapter 7

I think the worst part about my breakup with Mike was the surprise. Make that surprises, plural. Because there's never just one.

All the anger and betrayal and tears were awful, but there's something about the surprise pains that really gets to me. Like when I think I have a handle on things, no matter how messed up they might be at the moment, and then without any warning Mike pulls a figurative sucker punch and the world is spinning around me.

The first blow was when I discovered he'd been cheating. Two weeks after that, when I'd kicked Mike out but was still unaware of how much my life was changing, I ran into Terry at the café we all used to go to practically every day.

Terry has been Mike's best friend since grade school. He was like a brother to me. When I saw him that day he was uncharacteristically evasive, almost noncommittal. It didn't take me long to put it together.

As a lawyer I can tell when someone is hiding information, especially someone as easy to read as Terry.

"You knew, didn't you? You knew all along," I accused him.

His guilty expression was all the confirmation I needed.

"You knew what he was doing and you didn't think to tell me?" I demanded.

"Listen, whatever happened between you and Mike has nothing to do with me. Don't put your mess on me," Terry retorted.

"All the time you spent in my home, every time the three of us went out, you were lying to my face! Don't act like you aren't involved!" I raised my voice.

I didn't care that we were in the middle of the café and people were starting to stare.

"Sure, I knew, okay. But Mike's my brother, alright? I wasn't going to go behind his back if that's what you're implying. What he does is his own business," Terry pointed a finger at me angrily.

"You spent every holiday with us, Terry. Both of us. You were like family to me, you piece of shit!" I spat, slapping his expensive coffee out of his hand to splatter across the floor, and stormed out of the café.

I didn't care about making a scene because I had no intentions of ever going back there. As I walked home, anger simmering inside me and spilling over in hot tears, I decided that I never wanted to see Terry or Mike's faces ever again.

That day instigated my plan to move out of the city and to start my life over.

There were a lot of things I did in those days that I regret, besides spilling coffee for some poor barista to mop up. The desperate late night phone calls to Mike that invariably ended in a bitter argument. The hours spent scrolling through my social media, analyzing each photo to try and pinpoint where it all went wrong. Slashing the tires of Mike's precious BMW with my katana.

No, on second thought, I don't regret that last one at all. I'm actually rather proud of it, not that I can tell anyone. Not until the statute of limitations has expired, anyway, and by then Mike will be nothing but a distant memory.

In the meantime, putting physical distance between myself and the broken remains of my old life did me a lot of good. Then the next surprise came.

Andre was happily slurping his Cheerios while I opened yesterday's mail, absently wondering when that Rick Grimes was finally going to break down and call me.

The return address was for an unfamiliar law office in Atlanta, which didn't alarm me because it wouldn't be the first time that something meant for my new office was accidentally sent to my new home instead. I opened it and my eyes registered the words 'Notification of Forfeiture of Parental Rights' and, flipping to the last page, Mike's signature.