The Breakup Club

Kristen — Tuesday, Around 4PM

“So how you’re holding up?”

God, I hate that phrase. It’s not even a real question—it’s a socially acceptable way to check if I’m actively sobbing in the bathroom.

“Good,” I say to Marjorie, my cubicle neighbor and part-time office gossip wire. She’s the one who “accidentally” found out about my breakup, which in Marjorie-speak means she heard it, digested it, and then reheated it three times before serving it to the floor.

Yep. Three years. Down the drain. Turns out my ex’s idea of “business meetings” and “networking events”—which he claimed to despise—were just cover for fucking his way through every woman in a ten-mile radius with a pulse and bad judgment. Motels. Random apartments. Probably a gas station bathroom if the Yelp reviews were decent enough.

I found out because he asked me to send some document to his coworker. His laptop was dead, so I went to use his phone. And there it was—Tinder, sitting proudly on his home screen like it belong there. Bright red, smug little flame logo. I opened it. I scrolled. I learned things no one should have to learn about their own boyfriend’s… extracurriculars.

By the time he got home, I already knew he liked “long walks on the beach,” “good wine,” and apparently women named Brittany with exactly two T’s and a fondness for bathroom mirror selfies.

I didn’t cry. I just handed him his phone and said, “Your Brittanys are blowing up your notifications.”

Then came the slow, miserable process of untangling our lives. Not the big cinematic breakup moments—no tears in the rain or screaming in the driveway—just the petty, administrative purgatory of deciding who gets the toaster.

We fought over appliances like two starving raccoons fighting over a dumpster bag. He wanted the air fryer “because I use it more,” which was hilarious given he thought seasoning meant adding ketchup. The lease was a whole other battleground—months of awkward negotiations that felt less like splitting up a home and more like negotiating the surrender of a minor European country.

Finances were the real trench warfare. Venmo requests flying back and forth like sniper fire: $42 for “your half of the Costco haul,” $15 for “wine you drank most of,” $8 for “the shower curtain rod you insisted we needed.”

It was exhausting. Ugly. Stupid. And the worst part? This was a man I once pictured standing next to me in a tux, reciting vows, possibly crying. I used to think about us picking out baby names and now I was arguing with him over whether the blender counted as a “joint investment.”

Turns out, nothing kills romance quite like hissing “well then YOU take the fucking Crock-Pot” at someone you once considered the love of your life.

Marjorie leans in, like she’s about to uncover Area 51. “You know, I always thought he looked… shifty.”

Of course she did. People always “always thought” things after it’s too late for the information to be useful.

I force a smile that could qualify for hazard pay. “Noted. I’ll add it to my post-breakup scrapbook. Right next to ‘you deserve better’ and ‘at least you’re free now.’”

Marjorie looks mildly offended, which is fine. The truth is, my emotional bandwidth for office small talk right now is at “unplugged fax machine” levels, and if I hear one more person ask me how I’m “holding up,” I might just start answering with, “Well, I’ve joined a cult, sold all my furniture, and now live in a tent.”

I get up from my chair and drift toward the copy machine, fully on autopilot. The machine hums, spits out paper, and for a second I consider just watching it until retirement. A few more copies and I’m done for the day.

When 5 o’clock hits, I’m not exactly sprinting for the door. It’s not that I want to stay here—God, no—but home isn’t exactly some beacon calling me back either.

My building is… let’s call it “character-driven.” Old, noisy, a little grimy in ways you can’t quite clean. We picked it because the rent was cheap-ish and it was close enough to work that you could roll out of bed and still make it on time if you skipped mascara.

The laundry situation is straight out of a low-budget horror film. No in-unit machines, just a creepy basement floor with flickering fluorescent lights, rows of coin-operated washers, and a vending machine that hasn’t been updated since the Clinton administration. You have to feed it quarters and hope it doesn’t jam while spitting out something vaguely shaped like a Snickers.

It was our “transition” place—temporary, a launchpad. The plan was: save up, get married, buy a house. You know, the standard brochure life. But now it’s just me in this faded halfway point, like someone forgot to move the game piece forward.

The hallway smells faintly of boiled cabbage and maybe regret. I used to imagine we’d laugh about it someday, telling friends, “Remember our little starter apartment?” Now the joke’s on me—I’m still in it, starter phase extended indefinitely.

I make the hellish commute home—forty minutes of stale bus air, headphone wires tangling themselves into unsolvable knots, and a guy across the aisle loudly FaceTiming what I assume was his divorce lawyer. By the time I trudge up to the fourth floor, my key feels like it weighs three pounds.

I get inside and immediately start ticking off the boxes of “things a functioning adult does,” as if the act alone will trick my brain into believing I’m thriving. Shower. Check. Scroll through the fridge and freezer like I’m browsing a very sad dating app—nothing I want, but technically there are options. A limp bag of spinach, a jar of pickles, and something in Tupperware I’ve been avoiding eye contact with for two weeks.

I pretend I’m fine. I putter around, folding laundry that didn’t need folding, wiping down the kitchen counter even though it was already clean. At some point I boil pasta—not because I want pasta, but because boiling pasta feels like progress.

From the outside, it probably looks stable. Normal. Like I’ve nailed the whole “single woman keeping it together” thing. But from the inside? It’s a performance. I’m just an actress in an aggressively boring play titled See? She’s Totally Okay.

After a half-hearted scroll through Netflix—thirty minutes of aimlessly flicking past crime docs, cooking shows, and something starring a vaguely familiar Australian man—I settle on something objectively terrible. Not so-bad-it’s-good terrible. Just bad enough to be harmless background noise while I slowly turn into furniture.

I flop onto the couch like I’m auditioning for a mattress commercial. Toss. Fluff the pillow. Adjust the blanket. Watch for about three minutes before realizing I haven’t absorbed a single frame of what’s on screen.

Then it hits—the craving. That deep, primal urge for something sweet. Not “Oh, a piece of fruit would be nice” sweet. I mean sugar that makes your teeth ache and your pancreas write a resignation letter. Cake, cookies, something that comes in plastic packaging and has no relationship to actual nutrition.

I do a mental inventory of the kitchen. There’s maybe a spoonful of ice cream left, hard as a rock in the freezer because I’m too lazy to defrost it properly. There’s also half a sleeve of Oreos, unless I’m misremembering and ate those during last week’s emotional apocalypse.

The craving grows. I can’t focus on the terrible show anymore because my brain has decided the only plot that matters is Will She Get Dessert? Spoiler: yes, but with maximum drama.

I scour the cabinets like a raccoon with rent due—flinging open doors, rooting around behind cans of chickpeas and dusty bottles of vinegar I’ve owned since Obama was in office. Nothing sweet in sight except for a bag of pure sugar, which I briefly consider eating with a spoon before deciding that’s a line I’m not emotionally ready to cross.

The clock says 11:41 p.m. The nearest bodega is three blocks away, and I have exactly zero interest in becoming a cautionary tale on the local news: Woman Leaves Apartment for Twinkie, Never Returns.

Which leaves me with one grim option: the vending machine in the laundry room. The machine that’s older than most of my coworkers. The machine that hums ominously and blinks its little red digital price tags like it’s daring you to trust it. Half the snacks inside look like they’ve survived at least one presidential administration, maybe two.

Still… there’s a Snickers in there. Or something that claims to be a Snickers. And at this hour, my standards are low enough to consider it a perfectly reasonable life choice.

I grab my keys, already regretting the decision but too far gone to turn back. This is my life now—11:45 p.m., no pants with a waistband, and an impending rendezvous with a candy bar that may or may not survive digestion. The basement, of course, is lit like the opening scene of a Dateline episode.

Six flights down—because of course the elevator’s out again—and I hear the faint whir of a dryer. Great. A witness. Perfect. Because nothing screams “thriving single woman” like me in baggy sweatpants, a faded graphic tee from college, and bunny slippers with one floppy ear permanently bent.

I shuffle through the narrow hallway, push open the laundry room door, and there he is: some guy I’m pretty sure lives on my floor. We’ve passed each other maybe three times, enough for that awkward half-smile recognition. Tonight, though, he looks… well, equally tragic.

Long beard edging into wizard territory, hair doing that thing where it’s long enough to annoy you but not long enough to look intentional. Hoodie with a suspicious stain right in the front, gym shorts that might be older than both of us, and flip flops. Flip flops. At least I’m not the only one serving couture straight from the rock-bottom chic collection.

He’s parked on this rickety bench beside the vending machine, methodically working his way through a bag of M&M’s like it’s a fine charcuterie board. There’s a half-empty bottle of Mountain Dew at his feet. The man has clearly settled in for the long haul, as if this basement laundromat is a viable Friday night venue.

And suddenly I feel less like the star of a shameful midnight snack run and more like I’ve stumbled into a sad little speakeasy for the terminally unmotivated.

I walk up to the vending machine, already locked in on my prize. There it is—Snickers, slot B4, glowing under the flickering fluorescent light like some junk-food Holy Grail. I fish a crumpled bill out of my pocket, feed it into the machine, and it slurps it up with that smug little whirr. My finger hovers over the button.

“Don’t go for the Snickers,” he says.

I turn, slow. “What?”

“It’s a trap,” he says, dead serious, like he’s warning me about quicksand or the mafia. “The spring won’t release it. I lost four bucks already.”

I blink at him. “And you’re just… sitting here? Watching people make the same mistake?”

He shrugs, pops another M&M into his mouth. “I figure they should know the truth.”

I glance at the Snickers again. It sits there, smug as hell, behind its little coil prison. A candy bar con artist. “So you’re telling me this thing is just… holding people’s snacks hostage?”

“Yup.” He takes a swig of Mountain Dew like this is war and he’s already accepted the casualties. “Happened to me twice. I came back for laundry, thought maybe it fixed itself. It didn’t.”

I sigh. Of course my night ends in a standoff with a 1980s vending machine and a man who looks like he’s been personally wronged by it.

I punch in another slot—C7, bright yellow Skittles—because fine, I’m adaptable. The machine gives a mechanical groan, then the spring turns, and down they go with a satisfying clunk.

“Smart,” he says, like I’ve just outwitted a seasoned con artist.

“Guess it’ll do,” I reply, tearing the bag open. The air smells faintly of warm laundry and industrial-grade floor cleaner.

He nods like we’ve just shared a moment of mutual survival. “I’m Liam, by the way. I think we live on the same floor.”

I nod back. “Kristen. Yeah. You in 3C?”

“4C,” he corrects, “right across from you. I’ve got the door with the broken peephole.”

Ah, yes—the mysterious door I always assumed belonged to a chain-smoking retiree or a guy running an illegal reptile rescue. “Cool,” I say, because what else do you say to someone who just shared their door’s most defining flaw?

He shrugs, pops another handful of M&M’s, chews like a man who’s accepted that sugar is both the problem and the solution.

We sit there in awkward silence, the steady whump-whump-whump of the dryer filling the room like background music for a scene neither of us knows how to play.

“How many people do you think have gone for the Snickers?” I ask. I’m not sure why—maybe because going back to my apartment to eat vending machine candy alone feels like the saddest possible ending, and small talk with Hoodie McMountainDew is marginally less tragic.

“I bet that’s the trick,” he says without missing a beat. “They purposely break the Snickers slot. That’s how they pay for the machine.”

I look at him, eyebrows raised. “So what—you think there’s some shady underground vending machine mafia operating out of our laundry room?”

He nods, deadly serious. “Wouldn’t surprise me. You ever see the guy who comes to refill it? No. Because he doesn’t exist. The candy just… appears. It’s all part of the scam.”

“That’s bleak,” I say, shaking a few Skittles into my palm. “So we’re basically living inside a con.”

“Welcome to the building,” he says, like he’s just delivered the orientation speech.

I pop the candy in my mouth, lean back against the wall. For a second, it’s almost companionable—two strangers marooned in the sad, humming glow of a basement, bonding over their shared distrust of a $1.50 Snickers.

I shake a few more Skittles into my palm, glance over at him. “So, is this… like your usual midnight routine? Hang out down here, warn people about the Snickers?”

He smirks—barely. “Sometimes I switch it up. Warn people about the Doritos if they’re stale.”

“Community service,” I say. “Very noble.”

“Gotta give back somehow,” he says, leaning back against the wall like he’s been elected basement mayor. “What about you? You usually prowl the vending machine at midnight?”

I shrug. “First time. Desperation move.”

He nods sagely, like I’ve just passed some rite of passage. “It’s always desperation that gets people down here after eleven. Hunger, laundry emergencies, hiding from a roommate—take your pick.”

“Or avoiding your own apartment,” I say before I can stop myself.

His eyes flick to mine, curious but not pushy. “Yeah. That one’s popular too.”

We let the dryer fill the pause. It’s not exactly comfortable, but it’s not bad either—just two people in the quiet hum of a place that’s usually empty, talking about nothing and maybe something at the same time.

The dryer clicks into its cool-down cycle, the hum softening, and for some reason that makes the silence feel heavier.

Liam stretches his legs out, flip-flops slapping against the floor. “So, Kristen-from-across-the-hall—what’s your deal?”

“My deal?” I echo. “Like… in life?”

He shrugs, chewing on another candy. “Could be life. Could be why you’re wearing bunny slippers in public.”

I glance down at them. One ear is flopped over like it gave up sometime around 2019. “These are battle-worn. They’ve survived three apartments, one breakup, and at least two wine spills. Don’t disrespect the veterans.”

He smiles—just a small one. “Breakup, huh?”

“Yeah,” I say, popping another Skittle. “Three years. Ended in… let’s call it a highly educational way.”

He nods like he gets it, though we both know he doesn’t have the details. “Well, if it helps, you don’t look like someone whose life is falling apart.”

“High praise from a man in flip-flops at midnight,” I say, and he actually laughs—a real one, quick and unpolished.

For a moment, the laundry room doesn’t feel like a depressing liminal space. It feels… I don’t know. Less empty.

“Not alone,” he says after a beat, eyes fixed on the floor. “Five for me. She needed to become ‘someone else.’” He does the air quotes without looking up.

I tilt my head. “Someone else like… a new career, or someone else like… different haircut, new boyfriend, suddenly into crystals?”

He snorts. “All of the above, I think. Quit her job, dyed her hair purple, moved to Portland with a guy who makes furniture out of reclaimed driftwood.”

“Wow,” I say. “She really committed to the rebrand.”

“Yeah.” He tosses the empty M&M’s bag into the trash with a perfect arc. “I was apparently part of her ‘old life’ that she needed to shed. Like dead skin. Or cable TV.”

I give him a sympathetic look over my Skittles. “Harsh. But at least you didn’t get replaced by driftwood guy’s furniture. Could’ve been worse.”

He smirks faintly. “You’re saying that like you’ve met driftwood guy.”

“I’m saying that like I’ve met several driftwood guys. They all smell like cedar and disappointment.”

For a second, he laughs—really laughs—and it bounces around the tiled walls in a way that makes the space feel warmer than it has any right to.

He leans back against the bench, arms stretched out along the backrest like we’ve got all the time in the world.

“So, three years for you, five for me,” he says. “We’re basically… divorce court without the rings.”

“Yeah,” I say, shaking a few more Skittles into my hand. “Welcome to the support group. Meetings are whenever we run out of snacks.”

He grins at that, then tilts his head. “So what was your ex’s grand reason?”

I sigh, leaning my head against the cold cinderblock wall. “Oh, you know. The classic: business meetings that turned out to be Tinder dates. Very niche genre of betrayal.”

“Oof.” He winces theatrically. “I’d almost prefer the driftwood guy. At least that’s… artisanal.”

“Yeah, well, mine’s more ‘mass-produced.’” I toss a Skittle in the air and catch it. “Probably cheaper to manufacture, too.”

We both laugh, but it’s the kind that has a little grit in it, the kind that says yeah, it sucked.

The dryer buzzes, loud and abrupt, making us both flinch. Neither of us moves right away.

“You know,” he says, “this is the longest conversation I’ve had with another human in… weeks.”

“Wow,” I deadpan. “And here I was thinking you were out there giving TED Talks on vending machine corruption.”

He laughs again, and for the first time all night, the basement feels like somewhere I don’t mind being.

The dryer exhales that long, hissing sigh, like it’s just finished running a marathon it didn’t want to start.

“Guess I should take that out,” he says, glancing toward it like maybe, if he ignores it long enough, the clothes will fold themselves.

I gesture at the machine. “Don’t let me stop you from living your truth.”

He smirks, stands, and pads over in his flip-flops, which make that wet slap-slap noise against the tile. He pops the dryer door open and a puff of warm, fabric-softener-scented air escapes, immediately making the place feel 3% less depressing.

He starts pulling out a tangle of hoodies and sweatpants—everything in shades of black and gray like his laundry is actively in mourning. “You strike me as a dryer-over-washer person,” I say.

He glances over his shoulder. “Meaning?”

“Meaning you probably wait until you’ve got absolutely nothing left to wear, then do one massive load that could clothe a mid-sized village.”

He chuckles, tossing a hoodie onto the bench beside me. “And you strike me as someone who only does laundry when you’ve run out of clean pajamas.”

I hold up my bunny slippers. “Guilty. And these aren’t even technically clean. They’re just… seasoned.”

He grins, shaking his head, and goes back to folding—or whatever approximation of folding he’s doing.

The hum of the vending machine fills the quiet, and I realize I’m in no rush to head back upstairs.

He pulls out a pair of gym shorts that look like they’ve been through at least two natural disasters and lays them across his lap in a way that could not, under any definition, be called folding.

“You’re just… crumpling them into new shapes,” I point out.

“It’s a technique,” he says, deadpan. “Passed down through generations of men who don’t care about wrinkles.”

I raise an eyebrow. “Impressive lineage.”

He smirks, then holds up a sweatshirt, squints at it like he’s debating whether it’s clean enough to skip folding altogether, and then just kind of… rolls it into a ball. “See, now this? This is advanced.”

I shake my head but don’t move from my spot on the bench. Somehow, watching him commit laundry crimes is weirdly entertaining. “You know, I could help,” I offer, though my tone makes it clear I’m not actually dying to.

He glances over, mock suspicious. “You strike me as a hanger person. Neat, symmetrical. You’d ruin my system.”

“Oh, I’d ruin your system,” I say, popping the last Skittle in my mouth. “That’s the point.”

He laughs again, tosses another hoodie onto the bench beside me like an invitation. “Alright, Kristen-from-across-the-hall. Let’s see what you’ve got.”

And just like that, it’s almost midnight in a grimy basement, and I’m folding some neighbor guy’s laundry while he pretends his vending machine conspiracy theories are more interesting than they really are.

Somehow, it doesn’t feel pathetic. It just feels… easy.

We work through the pile, me actually folding, him “assisting” by occasionally holding something up like he’s on The Price Is Right. Every so often, he drops in a half-baked theory about vending machine monopolies or “why socks disappear” that makes me roll my eyes, but I don’t tell him to stop.

When the last T-shirt is stacked—my neat rectangle beside his sad little laundry dumplings—he dumps everything into a basket and slings it under one arm.

“Well,” he says, “this has been the most social laundry session of my life.”

“Low bar,” I point out, grabbing my keys.

“True,” he says, heading for the door.

We walk up together, the stairwell dim and echoing. Neither of us is in a rush, which is strange given we’ve just spent the better part of an hour in a basement that smells faintly of mildew.

On the fourth floor, we stop in front of my door. His is just a few steps down on the other side of the hall, the one with the broken peephole.

“Thanks for the folding clinic,” he says, shifting the basket to his hip.

“And thanks for saving me from the Snickers scam,” I say. “You’re a real hero.”

He smirks, gives a little mock salute, and heads toward his door. I unlock mine.

The hallway’s quiet except for the faint creak of his hinges as he goes inside.

For a second, I stand there, keys still in the lock, wondering why walking away from the basement feels like leaving a warm place for a colder one—even though my apartment’s the one with the heat on.