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Mandy peeks into my office, sees I’m alone, then closes the door behind her. “Can you believe I have not one but two NFL players’ kids in my class now?” She has a wide grin on her face. “And not just that, one of them is hot as fuck and single .”

I laugh. “Yeah. Too bad he’s an asshole.”

“What makes you say that?” Her grin falters a little.

“Oh, you know his reputation,” I say, feigning interest in the stack of papers in front of me.

“Right? I’ll take a one and done with Travis Hot Stuff Woods.” She shrugs as she collapses into the chair across from my desk.

I clear my throat. “I totally forgot to tell you this, but I actually met him.”

Her jaw drops clean down to the floor. “What?”

“I was picking up dinner at that barbecue place across from the Aces’ practice facility last week and he hit on me.”

Her eyes widen. “You got hit on by Travis Woods and didn’t bother to tell me?”

“There’s been a lot going on lately. It didn’t really matter since I’m in a relationship anyway.” I keep my eyes on the papers as I fumble for a reason why I never mentioned it.

I guess because it would just be additional ammunition for her to use in her quest to get me to dump Owen and maybe I just don’t want to hear it.

“Okay, we’ll get to that later. The girl, Harper—she’s been quiet so far, and it’s only been half a day, but I have some concerns. It’s actually why I stopped by. She isn’t quite at the pace where she should be in fifth grade.”

“Does she have an IEP?”

“Not that I found. She came from a private school in Los Angeles, and all they sent were her records. As you know, services aren’t required at schools not federally funded,” she says.

“You think she needs services?” I ask.

“Well, I told kids to read the directions on their own while they were working on an assignment, and she came up and asked me what they were supposed to do. I told her to follow the directions, and then she asked the kid next to her.”

“I noticed her pencil grip when I was in there,” I add. “A telltale first sign. Any other signs?”

Mandy shrugs. “It’s her first day so I didn’t want to put her on the spot. I’ve seen Bella including her in their friend group, so I think socially she’ll be fine. We have time to figure this out, and I don’t know if she’s just struggling or if it’s something more, but I figured you were the person to ask.”

“I can pull her this afternoon for evaluation,” I say. “I can just tell your class it’s standard first day of school stuff.”

“That would be amazing. Thank you.” She leans back to get more comfortable in her chair. “So tell me more about her dad hitting on you.”

“I have work to do,” I grumble with exasperation. It’s the truth, although I usually make time to chat with my best friend. Still, today…I just don’t want to get into it. I don’t want to think about him, and I’m still irritated with Owen, and even though I was able to fill my jug with coffee, it’s still not enough.

“Why are you a crabby Patty today?”

I huff out a breath. “I don’t want to tell you.”

I know what she’ll say when I tell her I’m cranky after I was up late fighting with Owen.

And maybe it’s time I start listening.

“Owen again?” she guesses.

I’m hesitant to tell her, but the way I vent is by talking with my friends. And I definitely need to vent right now. “We went out last night to celebrate after I finished the first draft of my resume and he talked about his work the whole time. I just wanted to talk about this potential new position and how excited I was about it, maybe bounce some ideas off him or do a practice interview, but somehow he made it all about him.”

She gives me a sympathetic smile. “I wish you could see yourself the way I see you.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You’re gorgeous and fun and smart, and for some reason you let him get away with being a toxic douchebag,” she says. “I’m sorry, but I really hate it for you.”

I’m silent as I let her words dig in.

They hurt, but sometimes we have to accept the pain in order to finally be free.

I’m just not quite there yet.

“Well I love him, so I need you to just be a friend and listen when I need to vent instead of bashing him every chance you get.”

She presses her lips together. “Okay,” she says, nodding. “I apologize if I offended you, but I’m trying to be the friend you need. If you just want to vent, I guess I’m not the right person.” She shrugs, and she stands. “Please just remember that I knew you before you met him, and you’re not the same Victoria. I love you, babe, and I will always love you, and I will always be honest with you. I will do my best not to bash him, but I also think it’s important for you to know that you deserve more. I need to get back to class, but just think on that.”

I can’t respond over the lump in my throat.

Is she right?

I feel like I used to be so strong, and over the three years I’ve been with Owen, I’ve become a doormat.

I’ve allowed him to control me, to manipulate me, to make me feel small and unimportant for three years.

And I think it might be time for that to stop.

I think Mandy might be exactly right. My chest hurts as I think about what this means.

Yeah, it’s been a tough few months…but it wasn’t always that way. I do love Owen, and we’ve grown up together in a lot of ways over the last three years. The idea of life without him is a little scary, and the idea of being the one to tell him that it’s over is even scarier.

It’s not just a conversation we need to have. It’s a complete and total life change. It means finding somewhere to live that isn’t his house. It means extracting my life from all the ways it’s tied into his.

It means starting over and pushing my dreams down the road.

And maybe this is the perfect time for that. I’ll be interviewing for a new position, and that means I can throw myself into my new job—if I get it. It’ll be something I can grow and nurture since I’ll need a distraction.

I give Mandy’s class a few extra minutes to get back from lunch before I head into the classroom to pull Harper.

“How’s your first day going?” I ask brightly as we walk toward my office, brushing away my own personal feelings as I look at this poor little girl who just lost everything and now has to live with Travis Woods.

“Fine,” she mumbles in a way that tells me it’s not fine.

“Ms. Miller said you’ve been talking to Bella,” I say, trying to get a gauge on how it’s going.

“I met Bella over the weekend,” she says. “Our dads are friends.” And after she says those words, I hear a little sniffle.

I look over at her as she wipes her eyes.

“Oh, honey,” I say softly, putting an arm around her shoulders as best I can while we walk side-by-side since she’s at least a foot shorter than me. My heart breaks and my chest aches for everything this poor little girl must be going through. She has big feelings she needs to manage, and when I got into education, I did it with the notion that I’d care for every kid in the school, not just the ones I’m assigned to. “Are you okay?”

She shakes her head a little but doesn’t answer, and then we arrive at my office. I let her in and close the door behind us, and I lead her over to the small table where I sit to work with kids one-on-one.

“Do you want to talk about it?” I ask.

“It just feels weird saying someone else is my dad. My dad died, and now I’m living with Travis, and it’s all so messed up,” she blubbers between sobs.

I grab the box of Kleenex I keep on my desk and hand her one, and she blows her nose and wipes her eyes.

“I just want to go home,” she finally says.

“I understand,” I say softly, and I rub her back a little. My heart breaks for her, and listening to her as she lets out the feelings it seems like she’s been bottling up makes me realize how small my problems really are. “I know it’s a lot of change all at once. I’m so sorry for what you’re going through. It must be very scary.”

She nods a little.

“Can you take a deep breath with me?”

She nods, and I draw in an exaggerated breath. She does the same. I hold it for a beat, and then I exhale loudly, and she does, too.

“Whenever I get upset, I try to take three deep breaths like that. It always seems to help me calm down a little, and then I try to look at things in a different way.”

“How else can I look at this?” she asks, but she takes another breath after she asks it.

“Well, you could look at it as a new adventure,” I say, and I do another breath with her. “You could look at it as starting over. Making new friends—including me. And what about this? I know he doesn’t feel like your dad, but Travis is kind of a celebrity. Did you know that?” It takes everything inside me to compliment her father.

Okay, so he’s used to the bachelor life and he’s taking in his little girl. There’s something to be said for that despite the way he really dug at my angry button this morning.

She nods. “My mom would watch his football games.” She takes another breath, which makes four, but it seems to be helping.

“So you’re related to a celebrity. How cool is that?” I shrug. “I know it isn’t easy at all, but sometimes we have to make the best of the situation we’re in even when it seems like there’s nothing good about it.”

She nods a little. “Thank you,” she whispers.

“If you ever feel sad or upset or like you need to talk to someone, you come right here to my office, okay?”

She nods again, and I know I should say something about how her teacher is on her side, too, but sometimes kids need another trusted adult who they don’t necessarily have to see every day.

“I’m always here with a listening ear.” I offer her a warm smile, and she gives me a tiny smile back. It’s a breakthrough, and I feel like she trusts me. “So, since it’s your first day, we’re going to do a couple different activities so I can help Ms. Miller determine the best placement for you in the different groups she has in her class. Does that sound good?”

She nods, and I run a battery of small tests to see what level she’s falling into when it comes to reading. By the end, I’ve found that she’s a word-by-word reader with comprehension issues, and she struggles with reading words in a list quickly or with creating nonsense words out of a combination of letters. On the other hand, her listening skills are excellent.

I want to have her evaluated further, but I have my immediate suspicions about what’s going on just from a quick eval. I draft a letter for her to take home to her father since I’d really rather not give him a call—after all, he’d only think I’m calling because I want him, which I definitely don’t.

I ask her to bring the letter back tomorrow to Ms. Miller with her dad’s signature before I send her back to class.

I finish out my day and head home with dread building in my stomach.

I know what I have to do, and I don’t want to face Owen, I don’t want to go through with the break-up…but I have to.

And even though I’m about to shake up my own life in ways I wasn’t expecting when I woke up this morning, that little girl sticks in the back of my mind.

Her father, though? I kick him right out of my mind.