Vivian’s POV
Vivian had been so busy hurting over things with Ryan ending that she had forgotten sothing very important. Sothing that had gotten her through difficult tis in the past.
She was not just so delicate flower waiting for the wind to blow her this way and that...no. She was a strong, resilient fighter. She had survived being cheated on multiple tis.
That was not sothing that she had ever thought she would be thankful to Bryce for.
But now she found herself glad that the other man had broken her trust so many tis in the past.
Just because this ti around, the person who had ssed with her feelings was a totally different man. It did not an that the ga plan had to change.
The very sa things that Vivian had often done in order to get over a breakup with Bryce. She could still apply them to the situation with Ryan Terrell.
And so bright and early on a Saturday morning, instead of wallowing in bed and just waiting for her heartbreak to kill her, Vivian was up and about.
Dressed in jeans and a shirt that had seen better days, she was singing power ballads at the top of her lungs as she cleaned the house.
So lost in the music that she sotis even used whatever she happened to be cleaning with, be it a rag that she was wiping the walls with, or a broom as a microphone when she got to really good parts in her songs.
Most of what she was doing was more than a little forced. She did not feel as happy, nor as energetic as she was pretending to be. But it was eons better than the horrifying depression that had been weighing down on her each ti that she’d been alone in her own apartnt. So Vivian threw herself into the act with all that she had.
She cleaned until there was not a single speck of dust left, and even the cobwebs that had been thinking of forming on her ceiling were a thing of the past.
With as much cleaning as she’d done, it should have been easy for Vivian to take an afternoon nap. But the mont that she sat down.
She instantly found herself back on her feet. An idle body was the key to doom and gloom.
If she wanted to keep her feelings of sadness away, then she had to keep moving. Her room was done, ( together with the bathroom), and she had just finished with the living room, so to the kitchen it was.
***
With all of the spices that she had in her kitchen rearranged in alphabetical order. The handwritten labels that Vivian had taken the ti to redo for all of them clear to see.
She almost felt like trying to give the whole resting thing a go. But then she caught sight of her vegetables and decided that they were in need of a good wash. So Vivian set about doing just that.
A few minutes later she was staring at the water running down the skins of her tomatoes and there was a soft smile on her face.
Clean vegetables really were reassuring.
Putting the veggies that belonged in the fridge back inside, she was just about to close it when she caught sight of so fruit.
That was what she really needed in her life...a fruit salad.
Taking out so fruits as well as a tub of yogurt, Vivian went over to her counter and got to work.
Why on earth had she been wasting ti crying over a man when she could have been doing all of this fulfilling stuff?
Thinking on that Vivian chuckled softly as she peeled bananas and cut them into chunks. She whistled a bright, happy tune as she made it through her apples and pears. The pre-school teacher was just about to break into a song and dance when she looked down and realized that she was peeling grapes...and stopped.
Oh, she had been peeling grapes...
Vivian had always found that she liked the little bit of resistance that grape skin gave when she bit into the fruit. But Ryan did not like grape skin, and the last ti that she’d been over at his place, she had actually peeled grapes for him. Realizing that she had been making the fruit salad as though both of them were going to eat it.
Vivian dropped her knife and backed away from the skinless fruit as though it was a cri scene.
It took several minutes of her taking deep breaths to finally get herself under control.
But even then, her hands shook as she reached for the grapes again. Her fruit salad no longer sounding as appetizing, she packed everything away and put it all back in the fridge.
The evidence of her slip-up firmly out of sight, Vivian went back to the couch and sat down. Her eyes fixed on the blank screen without her actually seeing anything.
***
When Vivian had been making the fruit salad, it had been bright out. But now she blinked and realized that the living room was dark.
Feeling like she was using way more energy than needed, she turned on the lights. Then she returned to her spot on the couch, grabbed the remote and switched the TV on. Given her luck, she found herself looking at a boxing match.
The n trading blows on the screen were not Ryan Terrell. But that did not stop her mind from seeing his face on theirs.
After watching for a few minutes, Vivian finally forced herself to switch off the TV and go to her room.
Not even bothering to get under the covers, she just lay over them and stared up at the ceiling, no longer fighting the darkness that she had spent most of the day trying to push away.
No matter how hard she tried to forget about him, Ryan Terrell just kept coming back.
She saw him in fruit salad, she saw him in the TV. Maybe if she just lay in the dark long enough, she would stop seeing the man and would no longer cry for sobody who did not care about her at all.
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