This shitty trailer is not my home. I can't make it feel warm. I hang pictures, light candles, fill it with books. Nothing is working. My home is with Avery, but he is a fucking bastard and I still can't believe he left me for that tall skinny blonde cunt he met the night before he dumped me.

The break-up was classy. He told me we were done while we were entertaining a party at our house. Dozens of people saw the end of our two-year relationship come crashing down. They saw it and they turned away. They poured another beer and kept on laughing and enjoying intoxicated conversations. They fucking carried on as I froze and nearly threw up on one of their shoes.

And Avery, bright and echoing Avery, just walked away, carried on entertaining.

There had been many events in my life that fried wires in my brain. Looking back now, this was definitely one of them. How do you function after that?

I walked around our beautiful home that night, the one we had lived in for two years, the one I had decorated and cared for. I watched strangers swing their legs casually as they sat on my countertop. I saw a card game being played at my dining room table. And I saw the love of my life through the sliding glass door, laughing with his friends. No care. No remorse.

I couldn't allow it.

I started walking around, pulling pictures off the wall. I knew I should just go lie down; my heartache mixed with all the alcohol I had consumed on the back deck was a deadly combo.

My hands moved of their own accord. I could feel eyes on me. The rubberneck fuckers who had watched my life be wrecked just moments earlier wanted to stick around to see how it would all unfold. Fine. I would give them what they wanted.

I didn’t feel the breaking of flesh. Suddenly, my exterior matched my interior. Blood red life was dripping down my wrist and it stilled me as I reached for another picture frame on the wall. I twirled, rabid, looking for the item that had done it. Looking for anything to fucking blame.

No one followed me to the bathroom to help me clean up. Where were my friends? Did I even have any anymore? My friends were Avery’s friends. And they had known him since childhood. Even though he just pummeled my heart, they would take his side. I just knew it. I'm glad I turned out to be wrong, with some.

After I bandaged myself up, I found myself in the kitchen. I may have imagined it but I think a few people left when they saw my crazy ass walking in.

I don’t know why the forks and spoons became the victims of my torment. I reached into a drawer and grabbed something, ran my thumb over the smooth surface. It was a spoon. Closing my eyes and praying the tears away wasn’t working. So I bent the spoon in my hand and felt a release inside of myself. I wanted to torch the entire fucking house. I would make sure everyone got out, the dog and cat, but I wanted mother fucking Avery inside. I wanted him to feel the pain burning my body from the inside out.

Before I knew it, a pile of bent silverware was sitting at my feet. I saw someone walk from the living room to the sliding glass door in our dining room, their eyes shuffling to the pile of folded cheap metal at my feet, never meeting my own bloodshot eyes.

Fuck ‘em. Let them worship at his feet. Let them see my crazy.

I sank to the floor and hugged my knees, trying to figure out what had gone wrong.

Thursday, on my day off, we had gotten into a fight on the phone. I hung up on him and threw our cordless phone into the yard. Avery loved giving me chores on my day off, and I hated it. I felt like he was my father and I was his daughter. We were supposed to be partners, equals, lovers.

He texted me after the phone call.

He never came home. He stayed at his boss’s house. His boss used to be his stepfather and still treated him like a son.

The freeze-out was jarring. We had fought plenty in the past, but nothing felt like this. I felt like I had been dropped off a tall building. Avery was cold, done with my bullshit.

He went out drinking after work on Friday, and didn’t come home.

All day Saturday, he spent his time cleaning our new boat in the driveway. He would barely speak to me, but I couldn’t stop loving him. I sat in the grass watching him, hoping he would drop down to the ground, and pull me to him.

It should have been obvious then, what had happened Friday night. But denial and I were best friends and she liked to coddle me. That bitch.

The morning after the party, the house was trashed and I woke up in the spare bedroom. Maybe I knew deep down that it was over.

I walked from room to room looking for Avery, and couldn’t find him. I started to clean up. Numb.

I called Avery and it went straight to voicemail.

I cleaned some more. Someone had ripped our bathroom mirror off the wall and stuck it in our bed. The covers had not been moved.

Where did Avery sleep? My entire body shook with dread. I knew it was the end, but I lived with almost-acceptance for many months after. I lived there after he told me we were done. After I moved out. After he got her pregnant. After he fell in love again.

I was stuck, still, standing in our kitchen, where we had cooked dinner together, made love on the counter. I was still there, salt-stained, a pile of bent silverware at my feet.

I felt some of that denial slip away the morning after our blues night. Connor’s eyes flashed in my mind. I saw his hands on the pool stick. The way he walked from his car. I remembered the way he smelled.

There is little life in waiting for someone who is never coming back. So I liked to pretend. Pretending was easy, and I was good at it.

I pretended I didn’t like the fact that I left my purse in Connor’s car last night. I pretended it was an inconvenience to text Blane, asking for his phone number, so I could retrieve it.

Danielle texted me as I was riding home with Joe, the guy I ran off with, the guy I ditched my friends for. She apologized for getting mad at me and told me she was drunk. That she misread my text. I felt a pang of guilt because I knew I was attracted to her crush. I had to run away with another guy because I couldn't trust myself when I was drinking.

I couldn't trust myself around a guy with a smile like Connor's.