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Chapter One

F or some, the idea of being covered in the bodily fluids of another person might be repulsive. Me, however? I’ve come to accept it as my fate in life. Tears, drool, snot—oh God, the never-ending snot. I’ve been covered in it all and then some. It’s not pleasant, but it’s life. At least, it’s my life.

“No, thank you, Adrian,” I said tersely, frowning down at the five-year-old whose mouth was firmly attached to my wrist. “Teeth are not for biting people.”

The boy blinked up at me with wide brown eyes before unclenching his jaw, allowing me to pull myself free from the death trap that was his teeth.

“It’s like your parents are razoring your teeth each night,” I muttered, rubbing the red spot on my arm where his mouth had just been. “No kindergartner should have baby teeth that sharp.”

“Ms. ,” Lilian wailed in the background, “She won’t share!”

Still gripping my sore arm, I turned to look at the curly-haired girl who stared up at me with expectant eyes and a pouty lip, waiting for me to solve her conflict.

“What happened, Lil?” I asked, bending down to her level.

“She-she-she,” the girl stammered, her little mind whirling as she tried to get her words out. “She has the doll I wanted, and I used my words like you said, but she still won’t give it!”

“Well,” I said, kneeling before her, “were you holding it first, and she took it from you?”

“No, but I wanted it. And I used my words like you said. I said, ‘I’m using this,’ like you said.”

“Right, but Lil, that only works if someone takes something you’re already using. You can’t use it to take something from someone else.” I smiled at her encouragingly, trying to explain delicately.

“But I want it,” she repeated, increasingly frustrated.

“It’s hard to wait our turn.” I nodded softly. “But maybe while we wait, we can play with the horse you like—”

Taylor Swift’s melodic vocals erupted from the cell phone in my pocket that, apparently, I’d forgotten to silence. I pulled it out, ready to reject the call, when I saw my boyfriend’s name flashing on the screen.

I answered the call, tucking the phone between my shoulder and ear to keep my hands free as I reached for Lilian’s other toy.

“Dave?” I asked, answering only because he knew better than to call me when I was at work. “Is everything okay?”

“I don’t want the horse!” Lilian cried as I held the offensive object in question in front of her.

At the sight of her tears, I dropped the horse, scrambling to find something else that might distract her while I figured out why Dave was calling me.

“Jesus, it’s loud in there,” came Dave’s answering reply.

“That’s kindergarten for you.” I laughed. “What’s up? Is something wrong?”

He was silent on the other end, causing my heart to plummet into my stomach.

“Dave?” I asked again, my voice a bit desperate. “What’s wrong? Is everything okay?”

“Not really, no,” he replied cautiously. “We need to talk.”

“Oh my God, is it my mom?” I blanched, the mayhem of the classroom fading into background noise.

My eyes darted around the room until I found my coworker casually scrolling on her phone in one of the tiny chairs beside a girl coloring.

“Julie,” I called across the room, “can you take over here?”

She looked up slowly as if she’d forgotten she was in a classroom. With a barely perceptible eye roll, she put her phone in her pocket and came over to where I was standing, giving me a chance to dart into the hallway, mumbling a “thanks” to her as I left.

“No,” Dave said. “It’s not your mom. It’s—”

“Oh, thank God.” I heaved a sigh of relief, feeling like I could finally breathe again. “Well, honey, I love you, but I’ve got to get back to—”

“I think we need to break up.”

And just like that, the air was gone again.

“W-what?” My lip actually trembled. “What do you mean? I-but we- but… what?”

“I’m sorry,” he said awkwardly, “but I just really think that it’s for the best.”

“For the best?” I repeated numbly. “What’s for the best?”

“For us to, you know… break up,” he explained as if I were an idiot for not picking up on it.

And you know, maybe I was. Maybe I was the biggest, most na?ve idiot in the world because I thought, after six years of being with someone, there would be no possible way they’d spring a breakup on me out of nowhere over a phone call.

“Why are you doing this now ?”

“I’ve just been thinking lately. All my friends are single, and they’ve been giving me a lot of shit for being tied down for so long,” he trailed off. “You know, we started dating so young. I never really got to experience what else is out there. And you didn’t either, right? That’s what I mean when I say I think it’s for the best. For both of us.”

“But we can talk about this,” I pleaded, desperate for something to fix the agony that was tearing through my chest. “We can try—”

“No, ,” he interrupted. “I’ve thought about this a lot, and I’m not going to change my mind. I hope you can understand.”

I nodded, but of course, he couldn’t see that. Just like he couldn’t see the way the tears rolled down my cheeks or the way my fists clenched by my sides until the nails dug into my palms hard enough to leave a mark, all because of his words.

“Okay,” I said, my voice barely a whisper. “Well, um. Thank you for all that. And, um, good luck out there, I guess?” I laughed sardonically, not sure how to conclude a conversation I never imagined having.

“—” he said, but I ended the call and then promptly turned my phone off, wanting to be unreachable for the rest of the day.

I closed my eyes, wiping the tears on my sweater before heading back into the battlefield that was my classroom.

In the corner, Julie was scrolling on her phone again while Lilian still sobbed, clutching the sought-after doll she had wanted just moments prior.

“Lil, what’s wrong?” I went over, grateful to have someone else’s crisis to worry about for the moment, no matter how insignificant it seemed to me. “It looks like Kenzie gave you a turn with the doll?”

I looked to where the little girl was playing joyfully with the stallion toy that Lilian had not so delicately rejected.

“Yes.” She wailed miserably.

“What’s wrong then?”

“I want to play with the horse.” She threw herself into my arms, sobbing.

But what were a few more tears on my already sadness-soaked sweater?