A Break-Up Story

Lucy

691200 seconds. 80640 minutes. 1344 hours. 56 days. 8 weeks. 2 months.

That's all the time that has passed after their breakup. Since the last time they stayed up all night, in their shared bed, talking about anything and everything.

Lucy didn't know what to do with herself anymore, except wallow in self-pity and play the Time-Keepers assistant. It was driving her insane but there wasn't much that interested her anymore. Her friends would kill her if they heard her say that. That is, if she even had friends. He had been her life. So much so, that she had started neglecting the closest thing she had to a family.

This fact made her rethink her plans of lying on her bed and finally deleting the pictures of him in her phone. She decided to call Mary, her confidant. Mary, thankfully, didn't sound bitter over the fact that Lucy had ignored her for so long. She immediately agreed to meet Lucy at their favourite coffee shop down the road, but not without suggesting that the whole circle of friends would have to be there.

Lucy was a bit apprehensive about the idea, but swallowed the stone that had settled in her throat and went ahead and got ready to go out. It had been a long time since she had last dressed for a casual day with friends, but she was surprised to find that it was still like second nature to her.

She entered the coffee shop, hoping that Mary was the only one present but alas, all three of her friends sat there at their usual table, chatting happily. Happy? When last was she happy?

She sat down right next to Mary. She greeted her friends and they all continued chatting like they had always done. How could they go on like nothing was wrong? Didn't they see her broken heart?

She suddenly felt familiar, dainty hands holding hers. That's when she realised she had zoned off.

"Lucy, are you okay?" The voice belonging to the owner of the hands asked. No. She wanted to scream. No, I'm not okay. But she didn't, she just smiled in the usual Lucy style and said," Oh I'm fine. Although, I did notice the hairstyle change and, wow, that manicure. Where did you get that done?"

"Oh, remember that French guy I was totally infatuated with before?" Dora asked. And boy, did Lucy remember him. A Paul Walker with a French accent, it was hard to forget him.

"Yeah, I remember him .What about him?"

"Well, it turns out that he likes guys just as much as you and I. He did my hair and mani-pedi," she answered.

Wow, I hadn't expected that. At least she had made a friend. Everyone around the table started discussing manicures and gays until Mary's voice cut through all the chatter.

"Alright ladies. I know we can sit here and talk about hot gay guys for hours, but we have a Code Blue here that we need to take care of. Our lovely friend here is suffering from a bout of the blues and needs our support. I trust we are all aware of Situation Cole, right?" There were nods around the table. She looked at all her friends' faces and was touched by how serious and concerned they looked.

Situation Cole was what they had named the events that had transpired two months ago. Her friends hadn't said 'we told you so' to Lucy when she found out that her ex had been cheating on her but they had told her so. They had had a meeting like this one countless times when she was dating her ex, Cole. They had all warned her against the relationship. Arabelle, the sweet one in the group, had supported her for the sake of it, but had made it clear that she wasn't happy about Lucy's decision about seeing Cole.

The conversation had gone down like this:
Mary: You can't possibly think this is a good idea. Lucy, I want the best for you. He is a musician , Luce.

Dora: An extremely famous one. And not to mention his past isn't one of serious relationships. He has been accused of cheating before. His face is plastered all over gossip magazines and the Internet for all the wrong reasons.

Lucy: But I can't just judge him off what I read in those magazines. We all know half of that stuff isn't true. It's Hollywood.

Dora: What about the other half that is true?

Arabelle: You're right, Lucy. We can't judge him yet. I'm not going to try to stop you from following your heart but you need to be careful. This isn't the first time you broke it off with him because of cheating.

So, Lucy had been told over and over again on other occasions and she hadn't listened, naturally. She wasn't even surprised when she saw the evidence of his unfaithfulness on those magazines Arabelle liked reading. She had only felt heartbroken that he hadn't proven her friends wrong.

"He still calls me," Lucy blurted out. They all focused entirely on her. "But, obviously, I don't answer," she defended. "He once tried to send me flowers but I called him and thoroughly explained to him that he shouldn't."

Her friends started clapping. They unfortunately captured the attention of most of the shop's patrons. "I'm so proud of you, being all assertive and stuff," Dora said.
"He is a scumbag. A real June's Diary L.A.N.C.E. He doesn't deserve you," Mary supported.
"Maybe he wanted to apologise and explain himself," Arabelle added. Yeah, maybe he did.

"You can't explain cheating, B. Cheating is unforgivable," Mary stated. For some reason, Lucy felt pools of tears forming in her eyes. This was the only reason she really hated Cole. He had made her a hormonal mess. He made her cry.

"Uh, guys. I think we need to have that sleep over we were discussing today. My place. We need to go buy the ice cream and all that junk though. Oh and lots of wine and of course, the mender of all hearts, tequila," Dora suggested.

Lucy's usually alcohol-avoiding self perked up at the idea of drowning her sorrows. What she was most afraid of is that maybe her sorrows could float.