Oh dear God, someone please make the incessant pounding stop. At first, I figured it was just the noise inside my head trying to get out. I swore the house shook with the pounding on the doors.

Yes, doors. Whoever was out there walked around to the backyard and pounded on the patio doors as well. I hoped they didn’t scare my birds.

More pounding. But I just lay alone in my big bed with the sun shining its ironic self on my face. Feeling the warmth unsuccessfully attempting to give me the solace I so needed was too little too late. Just another few minutes, then I’d get up.

Or maybe not.

I’d been playing that game all morning. Now it’s—I had no clue what time it actually was. If there was some way to lift my head off my pillow to take a look at my clock, I would. However, my head, like every other part of my body, felt like it weighed a thousand pounds. That was pretty heavy, therefore, impossible to lift. The same with my arms and legs. So I’d just been lying here, with my face pointed toward the window, searching for light in the sudden cloak of darkness Jason surrounded me in.

Yes, I knew it was all my fault for acting like a psychopath stalker, following him all around without him knowing. But still, I apologized. He should have accepted it, no matter how weak it was.

Instead, his words just ran on a constant loop inside my brain. “You are the biggest, most dangerous kind of distraction, Vivienne.” I wished someone could make my brain stop its continual rehashing of our last moments together.

“I’m not sitting back, watching my dreams go down the drain because of some woman.”

“Leave, Vivienne. We’re done.”

Over and over and over again, that was all I heard going through my mind, driving me crazy.

“I’m fucking trailer trash.”

The banging ceased. Now I heard yelling from a familiar voice coming from downstairs. It might be my name that the noisy person called, but I was too tired to get up or to even call out. I’d get up soon.

“What the fuck?” I heard coming from my bedroom door. I didn’t turn or acknowledge the intruder.

The bed depressed in front of me. My body did a slight roll into Dean. “I thought something terrible happened. Jesus, what the...” He checked me over as he gently put my hair behind my ear. “Something bad did happen. What’s going on?”

Yeah, something bad happened, and now I’d live the rest of my meaningless life in this huge house that I built for no reason. I didn’t answer—I couldn’t physically answer, so I just moaned when he moved my chin over so he could look me in the eye. “What’s going on? You and Jason break up again?”

I made a barely noticeable nod, tears flowing out of my eyes all on their own. “Fuck, honey. I’m sorry,” he said to me, pulling my boneless body up onto his lap where he hugged me, rocking slowly. “It’ll be all right. I know it hurts, but I promise you, it’ll be okay.” I guess he knew enough about pain to speak the truth, but Dean had never been okay since Betsy died, and that thought just made me cry even harder.

My arms moved around his neck. I sobbed into his chest for what felt like an eternity. His arms held me tight, like he was somehow able to hold all my broken pieces together with his big, strong arms. If anyone was strong enough to do that, it was Dean, so I continued crying, letting him take over the job of keeping me together.

“Shhh, what happened?” he asked, moving my tear-stained face away from his now wet white T-shirt. I immediately felt the loss of his body and tried to dig back into him. He wouldn’t allow it. The dude wanted answers.

“I acted like a stupid moron and he b-b...b-b-b...broke up with me.” I closed my eyes tight, hoping to stop the tears.

“Aw, Vivienne. Shit. Do you think it can be fixed?” What an odd question? How did you fix something that was so broken? Like a glass shattered into a million pieces could somehow be glued back together again. Nah, you just swept that shit up and dumped it into the nearest trash bin.

“N-n-n...no,” was all I managed. The energy that took made me even more tired. I wished he’d just leave me to my bed.

“Fuck. First things first, you need some liquids in you,” he said, mercifully dumping me back into my comfortable nest. “I’ll be right back,” he whispered into the top of my head, planting a kiss there.

The bed moved when he rose up, leaving me alone once again to stare out the window. From the hall I heard, “Yeah, I found her.” Dean spoke into the phone. I frowned, wondering who in this world would have noticed that I stayed in bed all day. It seemed confusing to me because nothing really mattered outside of this room, so why would anyone care if never left my bed again?

A short while later, he came back with a few glasses of various liquids. Nothing looked good, so I turned my nose up at everything he offered. “Vivienne, it’s three in the afternoon, and I’m guessing you haven’t had anything to drink in a long fuckin’ time. Now, pick a glass and guzzle that shit down or you’re gonna dehydrate.” It was three o’clock in the afternoon already? Wow. I’d never in my life stayed in bed all day, never afforded myself that luxury. But today there simply was no other choice. What else could you do when your body weighed a thousand pounds?

To shut him up, I sat up, grabbed the glass of orange juice out of his hands, and took a wary sip. My glands protested the incoming liquid. I shook my head. “Take another sip. Your body needs somethin’, honey.” My eyes got glassy at his words. I attempted another sip. That one traveled down better. Soon, I finished that glass and removed the cup of water out of his hands, guzzling that down, too. I hadn’t realized how thirsty I actually was. Kind of like how I didn’t how lonely and meaningless my life was until Jason showed up.

“Wow, crying really makes you thirsty,” I told Dean in between gulps. A look of sadness settled on his face. I was upsetting him. He sat down on the edge of the bed, removing his footwear, one big boot at a time. His back muscles strained as he leaned over, his biceps popping. Dean was definitely depriving some lucky girl of all that greatness.

“Scootch over. Make me some room,” he ordered, shoving my body over. I tsked out loud at the invasion, but moved over all the same. How dare he take my spot. Jerk. The bed was cold and foreign over here now that I’d been forced out of my tiny circle of security.

“Why didn’t you just get in the other side?” I whined, feeling more pissed off than ever at his intrusion.

“I like this side,” he said, digging out the remote from the mess of covers and turning on the TV. I guess that was that. I wasn’t getting my spot back. Dean didn’t really care if it pissed me off or not. His attention was now on the show. Typical man. With all the movement and fluids I drank, nature started to call. Damn. Now I had to leave the bed altogether.

Swinging my legs over the side of the bed in a huff, I stomped off to the bathroom.

I couldn’t tell for sure, but I thought I heard Dean chuckling as I stormed away.

“Ugh, how can you watch this mindless crap?” I asked him, pointing toward the TV, frowning in disgust at the reality show. The people on there were so clearly acting according to a script, it wasn’t even funny. How anyone could be fooled into thinking otherwise was a mystery for the ages.

All I heard from Dean was a grunt, and then he began flipping through the channels again. It required a coin toss to decide which was more annoying—the obnoxiously fake family pretending their kitchen was on fire or his inability to pick a freaking channel.

Unable to stand it any longer, I ripped the remote from his hand, flopped over, and started my own search for something stupid to watch. He got up, and I heard him tying his boots. The thought of him leaving sent me into a panic. Even though he was a huge pain in my ass, I still felt comforted by his presence. It was nice to have someone there to silently commiserate with.

“You leaving? I’ll turn it back. Here,” I told him, turning it back to the fake family whose kitchen wasn’t on fire after all. Phew. Good grief, this was crap TV.

“Just going out for some food. I’ll be right back.” Before I could protest or beg him to stay and not leave me alone with my thoughts, he was gone. The front door slammed as he tromped out. I flopped over, assuming the position of every bed-ridden TV watcher.

For some reason, the TV helped stop the noise inside my head, but not completely. Every time I thought of what happened with Jason, it felt like someone was digging a knife into my stomach. How could I have screwed things up so royally? Again?

After just half an episode of a timeless comedy show, Dean was back, clomping up my stairs. Did it not occur to him to take off his boots at the door?

In he swaggered with the nondescript, greasy brown bag of my dreams, throwing it onto the bed. Then he sat down, removing his boots again. “Bacon Burger, yum.” If there was one thing that could change my mood right now, it was this. My mouth watered at the smells wafting up my nose. I ripped the bag down the side to save time—because it was a big bag—and grabbed my burger. “You should take them off at the door,” I mumbled to him through a mouthful of deliciousness.

He frowned at me and replied, “What?”

I swallowed before repeating my sentence, “I said, you should take off your boots at the door.”

“Noted,” was all I got before he dragged the bag toward himself, yanking something out of it. “Why do you always rip the bag? I’ve never understood why you do that?” he said as he examined the bag with his free hand.

“Time-saver,” I mumbled again, saucy onions falling out of my mouth.

“Mmm, got ya,” he said through his mouthful of grilled chicken burger. As he chewed, he handed me a soda that he’d bought, which I gratefully accepted.

We ate in companionable silence with the exception of his attempted covert glances over at me when he thought I wasn’t looking. But I was. It was incredibly sweet that he cared so much about me that he came over to feed and water me.

He finished his burger first, stashing his trash in the ripped bag. “So, everything’s over with that guy?” he asked, lying down.

My burger stuck in my throat. I reached for my drink to wash it down. “Uh, yeah.”

“What happened? You were stupidly in love yesterday, then all of a sudden...”

I acted like a huge asshole and he doesn’t have time for women who act like they should star in their own movie of the week.

“Can I give you the short version? Because the long one will kill,” I whispered, setting down my burger as I started the short version.

Which evidently still killed.