Poppy Wright glared at me as she moved her fork through the baked chicken and cranberry salad on her desk.
Five weeks in, and I still couldn’t seem to get her damn lunch order right, although in my defense, she changed it every day—wanting four cranberries one day and a dozen the next.
Only a few years older than me, she was tall, ebony-haired, with cheekbones that could cut glass. No kidding, she was drop-dead gorgeous, with a delicious British accent, and always wore short skirts and dresses—barely-there eye-popping garments that seemed to make everyone in the office swoon. But she had a bad case of Crazy Bitch, and people in the office often compared her to Miranda Priestly. Cold. Mean. Insensitive. And as she stared up at me, nose flaring, something inside me snapped.
“Perhaps if you’d just learn not to be so picky and stopped randomly switching your order up each day…then, you know, you’d see I do get things quite right.”
Green eyes wide, she looked as though I’d just presented her a first-class ticket to hell. “I don’t know how people speak to their bosses back in America, but here, your tone is unacceptable.” She surveyed me up and down. “You can go home for the day, come back tomorrow with your tail between your legs.”
Verdict was in.
Cosmopolitan,London sucked.
My advice to everyone is,don’t try to nurse a broken heart while living far away from friends and family. Nights at home were bad; they were when I missed Lucas the most.
Lonely evenings filled with Netflix and no chill, I found myself scrolling through photos of us on my phone, reading ESPN about his game stats, and streaming games when I could find them. Shit, I even watched TMZ to see if I’d catch a photo someone had snapped of him with another woman, but there were none. In fact, other than those few photos that had popped up of him partying with Damian during training camp, nothing had popped up of Lucas since. I rushed to work early most days. The torture from Poppy was far better than being home, trying to piece together the events that led to a breakup that felt like I had swallowed shards of glass that ultimately pulverized my heart.
Sage and Chloe always seemed out of reach due to the time difference, but there were rare occasions I was able to catch them both on FaceTime.
“I miss you guys.”
“Then come back, you bitch,” Sage said, sobbing. “You’re missing out on the many stages of my belly growth.”
Chloe rolled her eyes. “You can barely tell she’s pregnant still.”
“How’sCosmo?” Sage asked, her face noticeably more round.
“I hate it. Nothing I dreamed of. Plus, my boss is the devil who walks around in short, skimpy dresses, barking about salad orders.”
Chloe deadpanned. “So, instead of your boss being The Devil Wears Prada, your boss is The Devil Wears Nada?”
We all laughed our asses off.
“But for real, you should just come home and stay with me and AJ, so you don’t run into…” Sage stopped talking, knowing she was never to sayhisname again. “Well, I just miss my best friend.”
Chloe scoffed. “I always knew she loved you more than me.”
Truth is, I wanted to go home, wanted to run into Lucas and yell, kick, and scream. Tell him I hated that my love for him was a waste—love spent recklessly, love neither of us could get back.
The three of us chatted for a few minutes more before hanging up and promising to video chat at least three times a week.
“Love you, Macy,” they both said.
“Love you guys, too.”
Pissed off about life,I headed to the local pub. But the annoying thing about living so close to where I worked was the fact I couldn’t go to the pub without bumping into someone from the office, like Oliver. Ugh.
“Are you pissed?” he said, plopping down onto the bar stool beside me, head atilt as he assessed me.
I nodded, guessing the brokenhearted angry scowl I’d been wearing on my face had become a permanent fixture. “Yep. Every single day.”
He asked the bartender for a beer. “Explains a lot, like how you always manage to fuck up Poppy’s salad.”
I rolled my eyes.
“Where do you keep your stash?”
I glared at him, cockeyed. “My…stash?”
