The minute I set foot in my apartment, Heather hops up from the couch, runs to the kitchen, and comes back with a bottle of Rumplemints and two shot glasses.

“Sit!” She uses the frosted bottle to point at the couch.

I drop my purse and flop back on the cushion.

“Look, I’m sorry I laughed. But you gotta admit, that shit was so off the wall. I was just kinda shocked you know? Laughter is my defense mechanism when all else shuts down.” She’s already pouring the shots, spilling some of the liquor on the table. “And…” she picks up both glasses, handing one to me. “Drink.”

I slam the shot back. She nods, motioning with her finger for the glass. She snatches it and hands me the other shot glass.

“Heather, really?”

“Fucking drink it.”

I gulp it back, wincing against the minty burn.

She pours two more shots, taking one herself. “Now. What the actual fuck?” She paces in front of the couch. “The longer I’ve thought about it, I kinda want to kill him for not telling you.”

“Yeah, I know, right?”

“And he was gonna take you to dinner—after he got finished at work? Oh, what a fucking asshole.” She stops walking. “I mean, really, he’s a fucking porn star?”

I give a half shrug, my stomach churning again. “Yeah.”

“Ugh.” Heather pours two more shots, sliding one across the coffee table to me. I grab it because why the hell not?

Exhaling, I sink further into the couch, waiting for that tingly salvation of the Rumplemints to kick in. “I’m gonna have to quit,” I say.

“Wha—Oh, oh, hell to the fuck no!” Heather shakes her head furiously before taking her second shot. “You are not quitting.”

“Uh, yeah. I am. There is no way in hell I am going to go back in there and watch that shit again. I mean, it was one thing when it was complete strangers, but that—Tyler, I mean, I just…I can’t.”

“Mm-mm. No ma’am. You are not quitting.”

“Are you serious, would you want to subject yourself to that?”

“No, but the job is only temporary, suck it up. Don’t back down.”

“Heather…”

“He deserves it.”

“Deserves what? How is that gonna—”

Heather holds her finger up. “Do you think he wants you there anymore than you want to be there?”

“Well…no…”

“I mean, did he act embarrassed at all?”

“A little…”

“A little, what the—never mind. You are not gonna let him win. End of it.”

I glare at her. “Heather…”

“No. You fucking hold your ground. You stay there. You make him uncomfortable.”

A slow, sick smile twists over her lips as she pours two more shots.

I sit, holding the drink in my hand wondering how in the hell in that warped little mind of hers, my staying and watching my ex film porn after porn is payback to him because, to me, it sounds like self-inflicted torture. “Okay,” I say slowly.

“He regrets it.” She smiles. “Think about it. What is one of the worst feelings in the world? You told me yourself when we were talking about exes. You told me the worst part about Tyler breaking it off with you was knowing that he’d moved on, that you meant nothing to him, right?”

Feeling that I meant so little to the person my entire world had revolved around was a slap in the face. “Yeah,” I say. “That’s a shitty feeling.”

“Well, karma’s a motherfucking bitch. Make him believe he means so little to you that you can watch him fuck other people. Make him want you and then burn his ass to the ground.”

I swallow. That buzzy warmth from the Rumplemints has wrapped around me like a drunken cocoon. “It’s so vindictive.”

“Well, he fucked you and didn’t tell you he was a porn star. I mean, what if you’d gone out to dinner with him, fucked him again? What if you started dating? I mean, what the hell, Jemma? This deserves a kick in the nuts if you ask me.”

I twist the shot glass in my hand.

“Plus, why give up a good paying job? I mean, really.”

She’s right. I shouldn’t quit that job and give up my income just because he’s a shit head. “God, it’s gonna suck.”

“Nah, just take that hurt, because I don’t care what you say, I know that shit had to hurt, and bottle it up into some bitterness. Bitterness takes the suck right outta everything.”

We sit in silence for a few minutes, and I let the drunkenness really kick in. I turn to Heather and laugh. “His name,” I say. “His porn name is Johnny Depth.”

She burst out in laughter. “Oh, my God. No.”

“Yes.”

“Johnny Depth?”

I nod.

“Classic.”

She stands, grabs her laptop from the entertainment center and sits on the floor, placing the laptop on the coffee table.

“What are you doing?”

“Looking him up.”

“Oh, Heather,” I whine. “I don’t wanna—”

“Shh. This is desensitization.” She pulls up the internet browser and types in the name ‘Johhny Depth’. Within seconds, all kinds of links have popped up. “Who’s Eating Gilbert’s Grape, really?” she says as she clicks on one.

At first, it’s just him walking into a room. “Oh, screw that,” she says and fast-forwards ten minutes in. I glance at the screen and see Tyler—I mean Johnny—between some girls quivering thighs. She’s screaming and fisting his thick, dark hair—just like I used to do.

“Oh, my God,” Heather says, leaning in closer to the computer screen. “I’ll tell you who’s eating Gilbert’s Grape. Well, actually…it looks like Gilbert’s the one doing the eating.”

The longer I watch it, the sicker I feel. That guy was my boyfriend. That guy was my best friend. That guy—a long moan comes from the computer then Tyler groans. “You’re a dirty whore,” he says. And that guy’s not the Tyler I knew. That’s it. I have to walk out of the room.

“Jemma,” Heather calls.

“Just, I need a minute.”

I shut the door to my bedroom, grab the remote, and flip on the TV. The Big Bang Theory is on, but I’m too distracted to actually pay attention. I reach under my bed and pull out a photo album, opening to the first page. It’s a picture of Tyler and me at my seventh birthday party, and that knot in my stomach grows heavier. I thumb through the pages, watching the two of us grow up together in the photos. The thing with Tyler is he’s not just a small part of my past, he is in every single memory I have of my life. I stop on one of my favorite pictures. One where we’d been at the lake all day doing absolutely nothing but having sex and lounging on the pier. At seventeen, it all seemed so simple. Life seemed so certain. I can still vividly recall the look in his eyes when he leaned over me, blocking the sun before he kissed me and whispered: “I mean, how many people get to spend their entire lives with the person they love? Not one memory of my life doesn’t include you and I don’t ever want to have one that won’t.”

And that’s why I have this pit in my stomach.

I toss the photo album onto the floor and sink beneath the covers. The traffic from the highway hums outside my window and I focus on the popcorn ceiling. My phone buzzes in my pocket, and I pull it out.

I’m sorry. I was going to tell you, I swear. I just had to figure out how. Not the easiest thing to divulge. I didn’t mean to hurt you…again.

And that makes nothing better because he knows he can hurt me. He believes he can still hurt me. And I wish he couldn’t.