Too Late For Tears, My Dearest Ex

“For three years, I handed over eighty percent of my salary to my boyfriend, Julien, believing we were building our future together. He scrutinized every penny, forcing me to walk home in freezing sleet to save forty-five dollars and denying me a forty-dollar space heater. Yet, while I lived like a pauper and my hands bled from washing dishes, I caught him spending nine hundred dollars on luxury gift baskets for our neighbor, Brandee. Worse, I overheard them whispering in the hallway. "You used one hundred and fifty thousand dollars of her savings to pay off my condo loan!" Every skipped meal, every freezing night, and every tear I cried over not visiting my parents had been funneled directly into building a kingdom for his parasite. The illusion of our life together shattered completely. I didn't scream or throw a punch. Instead, I quietly called a cash buyer to sell my condo out from under them and prepared to destroy them completely.”