CHAPTER 1
Colette
It was supposedto be a break. A reset. A “find-yourself-in-the-woods-before-you-lose-it-completely” kind of thing.
The cottage belonged to a friend-of-a-friend’s aunt, and when she mentioned she’d had a last-minute cancellation, I saidyesbefore I even checked the price. It was cheaper than therapy, probably quieter, and there wasn’t a single memory of him anywhere near it.
Well — ofthem.
It still felt weird to sayfiancé,even now. It caught on my tongue like something too sweet and already spoiled.
I’d spent an entire year planning a life with someone who decided, apparently, that it wasn’t enough. Or maybe I wasn’t enough. Either way, two weeks before the wedding, I found a text that started with “you can’t tell Cole” and ended with everything I’d built catching fire in my hands.
She’d been a coworker of his… tall and blonde and all the things IthoughtI was. But it wasn’t enough.
I wasn’t enough.
After that, it was nothing but boxes and silence andeveryone sayingyou’re handling this so wellwhile I smiled like a woman made of shattered glass.
So here I was, just three hours into my solo holiday sabbatical. Oversized sweatshirt, thick socks, no pants — because why would there be pants? It was just me and a comically large box of decorations I impulse-bought at the dollar store on the drive up.
And a second-hand Christmas tree shoved in the trunk of my rental car.
I had “Last Christmas” playing for the third time, and I was half-singing, half-yelling the chorus while I wrestled with a string of lights that only worked on one end. The cabin smelt of cinnamon and fake pine and maybe a little bit of regret, but it’s mine for now.
The couch sat buried in tinsel. My cocoa had gone lukewarm. I had… accidentally taped a bow to my hair twenty minutes ago and decided to just commit to the look.
If anyone saw me, they’d probably assume I’d finally snapped. But honestly? It felt… good.
Safe, even.
After everything that went wrong this year — the breakup, the move, the general collapse of my ability to hold a job longer than a houseplant — I just needed something soft. Something bright. Something stupidly, aggressivelyjoyful.
So, I planned on making this little rented cabin look like Christmas threw up in it. Because decorating like my life depended on it wasmucheasier than sitting still.
And maybe, if I do it right, I could trick myself into believing I’m happy for a few days.
I hung the last string of lights above the window and stepped back, cocoa mug in hand, to admire my questionable handiwork. Half the bulbs don’t even work, and the ones that did are flickering like they’re considering giving up.
Relatable.
“Not bad, Cole,” I told the room. My voice sounded too loud in the empty space, so I turned the music up another notch, letting Bing Crosby drown it out.
The cottage creaked when the wind hit it, old wood sighing like it might be just as tired as I am. I pulled the sleeves of my sweatshirt over my hands and whispered, “You and me both, buddy.”
I wasn’t supposed to be alone for the holidays.
I was supposed to be someone’s wife by now. A whole new last name, a new apartment, a new life that didn’t end with me singing to myself in a borrowed cabin, trying not to cry over string lights.
But the thing no one tells you about heartbreak is that it doesn’t kill you. It just lingers. It leaks. You wake up one day and realize it’s gotten into everything — your clothes, your playlists, even the way you butter toast.
So, fine. If heartbreak wanted to haunt me, it would have to share space with Mariah Carey and ten pounds of fake snow.
I tossed a handful of tinsel at the fake ficus in the corner. It missed entirely, landing on the floor in a pathetic little heap.
“Perfect,” I muttered. “Truly, the embodiment of holiday cheer.”
Still, I smiled. Because that’s what you do. That’s whatIdo. You keep trying. You keep pretending it’s not all falling apart, even when the pretending feels like its own kind of grief.
