MY EX-BOYFRIEND'S BROTHER IS MY NEW MATE

The thing about heartbreak was that it didn't care about Monday mornings. Audrey Mayweather stared at her reflection in the bathroom mirror, toothbrush dangling from her lips, and tried to remember what she looked like before Kendrick Blackwell had turned her into this hollow-eyed stranger. The girl in the mirror had dark circles under her eyes that no amount of concealer could hide. Her brown hair hung limp and tangled, and her hazel eyes, usually sharp, usually ready to challenge anyone who looked at her wrong, seemed dull. Defeated. She spat into the sink and rinsed her mouth. "Get it together," she muttered to her reflection. "It's been a week. He's not worth this." But the words felt hollow, and her reflection didn't look convinced. Seven days. It had been exactly seven days since Kendrick had sat across from her at their favorite coffee shop, staring at the table instead of her face, and said the words that had cracked something inside her chest. "I think we should break up." No explanation. No fight. No chance to fix whatever had apparently gone wrong. Just... done. And then, five days later, she'd seen him at school with her, the new girl, Sophia Reyes, his arm draped around her shoulders like Audrey had never existed at all. Five months of her life. Five months of inside jokes and late-night texts and learning the exact way he liked his coffee. Five months of believing that maybe, just maybe, someone had finally decided she was worth staying for. Gone. Replaced. Like she'd never mattered. Audrey's fingers curled around the edge of the sink, knuckles going white. She'd cried herself to sleep for three nights straight. She'd eaten nothing but ice cream and self-pity for two days. She'd let herself fall apart. But today was Monday. And Audrey Mayweather didn't fall apart twice over the same boy. She straightened her spine, grabbed her hairbrush, and yanked it through her tangles with more force than necessary. The pain was grounding. It reminded her that she was still here, still breathing, still fighting, still Audrey. No boy was going to take that from her. By the time she made it downstairs, her mother was already gone. The kitchen was quiet, too quiet. Diane Mayweather worked the early shift at Cedar Creek General Hospital, which meant she was usually out the door before sunrise. A sticky note was plastered to the refrigerator in her rushed, looping handwriting: Running late. Left money for lunch. We'll talk later. Audrey snorted. We'll talk later was her mother's way of saying I know something's wrong but I'm too busy to deal with it right now. She'd been saying it since the breakup. Audrey had stopped waiting. She grabbed a granola bar from the pantry, breakfast of champions, and shoved the sticky note into her pocket along with the crumpled five-dollar bill. Her backpack was by the door, heavy with textbooks she hadn't touched all weekend. She hadn't done any homework. She hadn't done anything except wallow. Today, that changed. The walk to school was short, ten minutes if she cut through the park, fifteen if she took the streets. Audrey always cut through the park. It was quieter, prettier, and she didn't have to risk running into anyone she knew. The morning air was crisp, carrying the scent of wet leaves and the last remnants of autumn. Cedar Creek was a small town, the kind of place where everyone knew everyone, where gossip traveled faster than wildfire, and where everyone had already heard that Kendrick Blackwell had dumped Audrey Mayweather for the new girl. She'd felt their stares all week. The pity. The curiosity. The whispered did you hear behind her back. She hated it. Halfway through the park, her phone buzzed. Audrey dug it out of her pocket and glanced at the screen. NORA: How are you doing? Nora Chen. Her best friend since the fourth grade, and the only person in the world who could ask that question without making Audrey want to punch something. AUDREY: Fine. NORA: Liar. AUDREY: Okay, I'm dying inside. Happy? NORA: Ecstatic. Want me to come up next weekend? I can be there Friday night. Audrey paused, her thumb hovering over the screen. Nora lived two hours away now, her family had moved the summer before freshman year. But she visited whenever she could, and right now, Audrey needed her. AUDREY: Yes. Please. Bring chocolate. NORA: Already on it. Love you, loser. AUDREY: Love you too. She pocketed her phone, something warm flickering in her chest for the first time in days. Nora would come. Nora would make her laugh and force her to eat real food and threaten to key Kendrick's car. It wouldn't fix everything, but it would help. The school loomed ahead, a sprawling brick building that looked more like a prison than a place of learning. Audrey squared her shoulders and walked through the front doors. The first person she saw was Kendrick. He was standing by his locker, laughing at something Sophia was saying. Sophia—with her soft dark hair and her gentle smile and her hands that kept touching Kendrick's arm like she had every right to. Audrey's feet stopped moving. Her heart stopped beating. For a moment, she was frozen, caught in the headlights of her own personal nightmare. Then Kendrick looked up. Their eyes met. Something flickered across his face, guilt, maybe, or regret, but it was gone too fast for Audrey to hold onto. He looked away first. That used to be them, him looking away when she caught him staring, her laughing and teasing him about it. The memory sliced through her like a blade. Kendrick and Sophia walked away, hand in hand. Audrey stood there, watching them go, feeling like she'd been punched in the chest. She thought she'd prepared for this. She'd seen them together before, at lunch, between classes, in the parking lot. She'd survived those moments. But it never got easier. It felt like being stabbed with the same knife over and over again, the wound never fully healing because someone kept ripping it open. "Audrey?" A hand touched her elbow. She flinched. "Hey, it's just me." Maya Torres, one of her closer friends, though not close enough to know how much Audrey was hurting. Maya's brow was furrowed with concern. "You okay?" "Fine," Audrey said automatically. "I'm fine." Maya didn't look convinced, but she didn't push. "Come on. We're going to be late for homeroom." Audrey let Maya lead her down the hall, forcing her legs to move, forcing her face into something that resembled calm. She kept her eyes forward, didn't look at Kendrick, didn't look at Sophia, didn't look at anyone who might see the cracks in her armor. The day passed in a blur. Homeroom. History. English. The words washed over her without meaning. She took notes she wouldn't read, answered questions she wouldn't remember, pretended to be a normal girl living a normal life. At lunch, she sat with Maya and a few other friends in the cafeteria. They talked about homework and homecoming and some new movie that was coming out. Audrey nodded along, contributed when expected, and ate approximately three bites of her sandwich. Kendrick was two tables away. She could feel his presence like a splinter under her skin. She didn't look at him. She didn't look at Sophia. She didn't look at anyone. By the time the final bell rang, Audrey was exhausted. Not physically, emotionally. The effort of pretending to be okay was draining her faster than any marathon. She walked out of school with her head down, not seeing anything, not wanting to see anything. The afternoon sun was warm on her face, a cruel contrast to the cold knot in her chest. She was so focused on putting one foot in front of the other that she almost missed the voice. "Audrey!" She stopped. Turned. Kendrick was jogging toward her, his expression unreadable. Every instinct screamed at her to run. But Audrey Mayweather didn't run from anyone. She lifted her chin and waited. "Hey," he said, stopping a few feet away. He was out of breath, had he run after her? "Can we talk?" "Talk," Audrey repeated flatly. "Now you want to talk?" He winced. "I know I owe you an explanation..." "You don't owe me anything." The words came out sharper than she intended. "You made your choice. We're done. Go back to your girlfriend." "Audrey..." "No." She held up a hand, stopping him cold. "You don't get to do this. You don't get to break up with me for no reason and then show up a week later dating someone else and act like you want to explain yourself. That ship has sailed, Kendrick. It's done. It's over. Leave me alone." She spun on her heel and walked away. He didn't follow. Audrey made it three blocks before her hands started shaking. She shoved them into her pockets and kept walking, teeth clenched, eyes burning. She would not cry. Not here. Not now. Not over him. But the tears came anyway.