Page 1 of The Break-Up Pact

Chapter One

Before I took over Tea Tide, I imagined running a tea shop by the ocean would be like something out of a Hallmark movie. I’d wear dainty outfits with Peter Pan collars. Customers would wave on their way in and greet me by name. My doting boyfriend would interrupt the morning rush to plant a quick kiss on my cheek at the register, and he’d marvel at how fast my confections were selling.

I definitely wouldn’t be wearing the same pilly leggings and flour-stained apron for the third day in a row as a wide-eyed stranger walks up to the counter and demands, “Are you Crying Girl?”

I glance down at the display case, searching for my last shred of dignity. Nope. It’s just rows of unsold scones.

When I look back up, the customer’s phone lens is inches from my face.

“I’m obsessed with Business Savvy,” she gushes. “I can’t believe you dated Griffin Hapler! He’s so cute.”

This girl is in high school, maybe college. Harmless compared to the sea of local reporters and bloggers that have been slinking in here ever since my ex-boyfriend turned me into a meme. A few weeks ago I was June Hart, owner of Tea Tide and connoisseur of cliché break-up playlists. Now I am either Crying Girl or Griffin’s Ex, both of which were trending on Twitter the night after I got dumped on national television.

It’s been a rough month.

“Will you do the crying face?” the girl pleads.

This is the part where that last shred of dignity would have kicked in. In its absence, I shoot back, “Will you buy a scone?”

“Um…”

She deliberates, eyes raking over today’s bake with such lack of interest that I might just do the crying face free of charge.

“Ooh, what’s the special?” she asks.

I follow her eyes to the little pink sign in the display case that says SPECIAL OF THE DAY, which I must have put in by accident in my sleep-deprived state.

“It sold out,” I lie. “Plain scone or chocolate chip?”

She leans in, lifting her phone again. “And you’ll do the face?”

And I won’t shove you back out onto the boardwalk and sic the seagulls on you, I want to say back. But that’s just the mortal humiliation and simmering rage talking. They’re not nearly as loud as the desperation to make some damn money today.

This mission is abruptly thwarted by Sana, who looks up from her laptop and says, “Take that picture and I will throw your phone so far into the ocean you’ll start getting texts from Poseidon.”

The girl lets out a squeak of surprise. Sana narrows her eyes at her from the corner table, tossing her signature high ponytail behind her shoulder like a whip and emitting such pure, unbridled “don’t fuck with my best friend” energy that I almost let out a squeak of my own.

The girl mutters something that might be an apology or a prayer before turning on her heels, the merry jingle of Tea Tide’s front door echoing in her wake.

I sink my elbows into the counter, resting my cheeks on my fists. “You owe me three unsold-scone dollars,” I say flatly.

Sana raises her eyebrows. “And you owe me a giant thank-you for protecting you from another bottom-feeder looking for TikTok clout.”

Unfortunately, that thank-you won’t help keep Tea Tide’s lights on. As much as I hate the stream of busybodies who have come in here to peer at me like I’m an animal in the Disgraced Internet Meme Zoo, they have helped boost sales. And Poseidon knows I need them.

Thoroughly distracted from her draft of “Four Mantras People with Irritable Bowel Syndrome Swear By,” Sana sinks back in her chair and levels me with a smug look.

“I could make all your problems go away, you know.”

I let out a disapproving hum, eyeing the rest of the shop. A few students from the local university, a tourist family with matching Old Navy sandals, a Wi-Fi freeloader sitting at the table outside who decidedly has not purchased anything. Not exactly the turnout I was hoping for today. The other downside of strangers mobbing the place the past few weeks is that it seems to have scared off my regulars—people who come in here to read or relax in the cozy quiet. I hope they’ll start coming back now that the coast is moderately clear.

“Just give me the word. I’ll go viral with an article telling your side of the story like that,” Sana says, snapping for emphasis, “and the whole world will know what a douche Griffin is, you’ll get your revenge, and I’ll get out of the digestive health journalism trenches and finally start working for Fizzle full-time.”

“Griffin’s not a douche,” I say quietly, mindful of the Old Navys and their little ears.

Sana lets out a derisive laugh. “And I’m not a perilously broke freelance writer. Oh, wait.”

I pull a fresh rag out from under the register to wipe down the front tables, making myself look busy. Otherwise, Sana will go on another one of her ten-point lectures on why I need to stop being civil with Griffin and pull a Carrie Underwood by digging the keys into the side of his pretty little souped-up Trek mountain bike. The conversation always goes the same way: I tell her it’s complicated, she asks what’s complicated about Griffin cheating on me and turning me into a laughingstock, I tell her he wasn’t just my boyfriend but my best friend, and she threatens to hurl tea at me for disrespecting the institution of best friendship, rinse, repeat.

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