Guys, especially, are told to get back “in the game” or “on the horse”. Sometimes this works, but sometimes it just delays the inevitable, something I found out the hard way. 

In my drab hotel room in Kathmandu, my friend Sophie’s face flickered onto FaceTime. I’d just returned from three weeks with no service, climbing the mountains of Nepal, and was eager to catch up on the type of social drama that seems so important when you’re 18.

It wasn’t long into the conversation that Sophie mentioned she had taken a trip to Newcastle with my recently-turned-ex-girlfriend and the guy who she had repeatedly assured me that “there was nothing going on.” My ears pricked, though I hid any visible reaction.

She let something slip, which hinted that my ex may have hooked up with our relationship-wrecker. Again, I bit my tongue, pretended I already knew and teased out a confirmation that they had slept together. Any nausea that I felt after hearing this news was quickly surpassed by a brutal stomach bug. Those remaining days in Kathmandu passed in a haze of vomit, self-pity and cold sweats. By the time I arrived back in London, I had been so ill that I had barely thought of my ex sliding around in the sheets with someone who still professed to be a “friend”. Luckily, there was someone else drawing me back home on whom I could focus my mind.

Before I went abroad, I was working a peculiar job as a street salesman for a flower delivery company. This involved standing on the pavement with a colleague and a basket of flowers, trying to convince passers-by to have needlessly expensive flowers delivered to their door.

A couple of weeks after my girlfriend and I had broken up, and a couple of weeks before I headed to Nepal, work sent me and a few other colleagues to some rural towns on the south coast. These excursions were renowned for being fun weekends away (sans managers), and I had heard more than one tale of late-night parties in work-provided Airbnbs. So, when I climbed into the minivan on Monday morning and caught the blue eyes of an attractive girl, I let myself smile a little inside.

We’d been able to see each other so clearly because we had both just left long-term relationships. We were in the same place, looking for the same thing: comfort.

On the first day, I found myself standing on a nondescript village high street in the rain with Lily, a gorgeous, 24-year-old girl, six years older than me. Hours rolled by, and the low footfall and persistent drizzle meant the sales continued to evade us both. Instead, we became more and more engrossed in our conversation and each other.

The format of the job often resembled a drawn-out six-hour long therapy session. Being forced to spend all day talking to someone you had just met whilst being ignored by strangers catalysed the connection. I talked about my family, mainly my brother’s learning disability, and she about her ex-boyfriend and the intensities of drama school. She showed me screenshots of her ex’s petulant messages. I said that he sounds like a child who’s had his toys taken away and that she should tell him that she needs space. “God”, she said, “I can’t believe you’re 18 and he’s 25.” I was overawed with feelings.

After this trip, we hung out once or twice. On a cold night near Waterloo, a week before I went to Nepal, I told her that I knew the age difference was big but that I obviously fancied her. The ball was in her court. “I like you,” she texted me that evening. “I’m expecting you to disappear shortly, so it doesn’t seem like a big deal.”

Having spent three weeks traipsing through the Nepalese snow, I was eager to get back to London to see her again. On the journey home, I pushed any intrusive thoughts of my ex out of my head, safe in the knowledge that Lily would be waiting for me back in England. 

The week after I returned passed in a blur of flirty text messages. We drank in underground Soho bars and kissed on the street outside. We swigged whiskey in her bed; my heart warmed and began to run away from me.

That Friday was our staff Christmas party, drinks flowed in the warehouse–cum–office and before long, people were piling into taxis heading north to a rave in Kilburn. When we arrived, I excitedly headed off to explore the space with a friend, not wanting to cling to Lily’s heels. We had already agreed to head home together. Smoke machines and driving basslines made it hard to navigate the dark floors of the brick building which housed the party. The night gave way to early morning, and I wandered once, then again and again, around the maze of sweaty dancing bodies, looking for her before the alcohol washed over me.

The next morning, I woke up in my own bed, unable to remember exactly what had happened but with a deep pang in my heart. Searching for answers, I opened up my WhatsApp and saw the messages I had sent to Lily. 

03:27: Where you?

05:53: Fuck u loool

Bit by bit, fragments of memories returned, and I pieced together the end of the night. Whether I had actually seen Lily leave with another colleague or been told about it by a friend, I was unsure, but my heart ached all the same. As the hangover set in, the tears began to flow. Curled up on the sofa with my mum, I cried and cried, protesting about how I hated girls. All the agony and love from my ex had exploded in a painfully full-circle week. A week of beautiful dates with the girl of my dreams that had clearly been too good to be true, sandwiched between a broken heart.

The whole affair with Lily had allowed me to walk right past any semblance of upset for the end of a formative two-year relationship. Without a shadow of a doubt, much of the outpouring of emotion that winter afternoon was a hangover of the news I had gotten the week before, but not all. Something had been real about Lily and I; perhaps we’d been able to see each other so clearly because we had both just left long-term relationships. We were in the same place, looking for the same thing: comfort. 

However, heartbreak is a path that you have to walk alone, at least for those first few miles. Only then can you begin to look around for a hand to hold. Pretending otherwise is always going to end in tears.

*Names have been changed.