MR MATCHMAKER

My house on Willborrow Drive was anything but quiet that Saturday. It was December 27th—two days after Christmas, and only twenty-four hours since the world as I knew it had ended. Twenty-four hours since I had reached across the marble kitchen island to grab Colby’s phone to check the time, only to watch the lock screen light up with a sequence of messages that shattered our marriage in a matter of seconds.

The holiday cheer hadn’t caught up to the wreckage yet. The warm white lights were still blinking in the living room window, casting a cozy, festive glow across the hardwood floors, and the towering balsam fir stood proud in the corner like nothing was wrong. It still smelled like pine and celebration. But underneath the heavy, tinsel-draped branches sat a pile of presents that felt like a sickening lie.

There was a Louis Vuitton handbag I had pointed out in a boutique months ago, wrapped in its signature saffron box with a thick blue ribbon. Next to it sat a sleek velvet case housing the gold watch we had stood admiring together in the jeweler’s window downtown just after Thanksgiving. When I opened them the morning before last, I had cried. I thought he was being romantic. Now they just felt like a way to hide the truth. Now, staring at the glossy wrapping paper and the neat, looped handwriting on the gift tags, those luxury boxes felt like nothing more than hush money. A calculated way to buy my distraction and hide the truth.

Every velvet ribbon, every crisp fold of paper, and every carefully chosen box was a cruel reminder of the man I thought I knew—and the woman he was messaging behind my back.

Sandra…

Every time those messages flashed through my mind, my skin crawled. Thinking of my husband and that woman—with her long, black hair—felt like a cheese grater being rubbed against my skin.

“Hannah, please.’’ Colby pleaded as he stepped into the room.

The desperation in his voice only made me more determined. ( As if begging can save him now) I ignored him, ripping his shirts from plastic hangers with force and marched back towards the bed where his suitcase lay open. It was already overflowing with socks and black boxers I had shoveled out of his dresser.

I tossed the clothes onto the growing, messy pile of expensive boxers and designer socks. I didn’t bother to fold anything or keep it neat—not like I used to when I packed for our honeymoon, or the weekend getaways we used to take when we were happy. Now, I just wanted him gone.

‘‘Han, careful! You know that shirt is Ralph Lauren,’’ Colby warned, stepping forward with his hands raised slightly.

I could hear the edge of panic in his voice as he watched me crumple the crisp fabric and shove it into the suitcase. Oh no, God forbid it might get a crease! As if I wasn’t the one who steamed it for him last Wednesday night. Just picturing myself standing in the kitchen, carefully working out the wrinkles to make sure he looked perfect for his meetings, made me want to scream. I had been trying so hard to be the perfect wife, and for what?

I didn’t think. I just acted, a raw mess of rage, hurt, and blinding betrayal.

Turning away from the suitcase, I faced the antique nightstand on my side of the bed. It had belonged to my grandmother, a sturdy piece of dark wood with delicate brass pulls. It had never really matched the modern, ultra-sleek dresser Colby had insisted on buying for the room, but I had never cared.

I yanked open the drawer and pulled out my scissors. Instantly, my mother’s voice echoed in my head: Never fight fire with fire, Hannah. She always told me I was better than that, that dignity was the best weapon when someone tried to break you. But standing in the wreckage of my marriage, I didn’t want to be better. I didn’t want to take the high road. I wanted him to hurt.

I snatched up his favorite Ralph Lauren shirt—the crisp blue and white pinstriped one he wore to every important business dinner, the one I had spent years pretending to like just to make him smile.

“You wouldn’t.” Colby challenged, taking a half-step into the room.

He stood in the doorway with his arms crossed, looking so sure of himself. His posture was smug, his eyes narrowing as if he were daring a child to misbehave. He truly believed he knew exactly who I was. He thought I was too weak, too passive, too desperate to keep the peace to actually do anything. He didn’t think I had it in me to strike back. He was about to find out just how wrong he was.

“Watch me.” I said, my voice cold.

I didn’t hesitate. I jammed the sharp point of the shears straight into the shoulder seam of the sleeve. With a few aggressive snips, the fabric groaned and gave way, and the detached arm fell limply to the hardwood floor. Colby’s cocky posture evaporated instantly. He staggered forward a half-step, his mouth hanging open in sheer, unadulterated shock. Seeing the smug look wiped completely off his face felt intoxicating. It was a rush of pure adrenaline, even if destroying a stupid designer shirt was nothing compared to the way he had just systematically ruined my entire life.

Driven by the thrill of it, I kept cutting. I sliced through the other arm, then hacked straight down the center of the body, shredding the expensive fabric into useless ribbons of blue and white.

From the foot of the bed, my Golden Retriever, Rufus, raised his head from his paws. His golden tail gave a hesitant, single thump against the mattress as he tilted his head in complete confusion, his big brown eyes darting between the flying shreds of fabric and the unfamiliar, roaring anger radiating off his humans.

‘‘I can’t believe you just did that,’’ Colby said, his voice dropping an octave as he stared down at the shredded blue-and-white fabric pooling on the floor.

“And I can’t believe you cheated,” I shot back, capping the accusation with a sharp, casual shrug that felt entirely foreign on my shoulders. “I guess we’re both full of surprises today. Payback is a bitch, isn’t it?”

I let a cold, sharp smirk cut across my face, savoring the pale, stunned expression frozen on his features. It was a fleeting, ugly kind of victory, but it was the only currency I had left. Turning on my heel, I dropped the heavy shears back into the open nightstand drawer with a loud clatter.

“It was a mistake, Han.” Colby said quickly.

I felt a bitter, ugly laugh bubble up from the depths of my chest, bursting through my lips before I could stop it. A mistake. As if those three syllables carried some kind of ancient, magic power capable of reweaving the fabric of our lives. As if saying it was an accident could magically erase the twenty-four hours of absolute hell I had just crawled through. I wasn’t stupid, and I definitely wasn’t the first woman in history to be fed that exact, pathetic script by a man trying to save his own skin.

“I never even met the woman in person,” he explained frantically, taking a cautious, placating step into the room, his palms turned upward in a plea for leniency. “It was just messages. That’s all it ever was. I swear to you on my life.”

“Just messages?” I shook my head, a deep, bone-deep disgust settling into my features as I looked at him. The man standing before me felt like a complete stranger masquerading in my husband’s expensive clothes. “What about the nudes, Colby? What about the sexting? The hours you spent hiding out on the back patio late at night, whispering into your phone while I was upstairs asleep? You’re a cheating, lying asshole, and the fact that you didn’t touch her doesn’t change a fucking thing. There’s nothing left to negotiate. We’re done.”

Colby let out a long, theatrical sigh, tilting his head back and aggressively rubbing his forehead with the back of his hand, pinching the bridge of his nose as if he were the true victim of this tragedy, as if my anger was an inconvenience he had to endure.

“So, that’s it then?” he asked, his voice dropping into a low, manipulative rumble. His sharp green eyes fixed onto mine, narrowing slightly as they swept across my face, searching with clinical precision for any flicker of hesitation, any crack in my armor, any lingering sign of the soft, compliant girl he had married. He was still clinging to the arrogant belief that if he just found the right words, if he just played the right emotional chord, he could talk his way back into my bed. “You’re just going to throw everything we built away? Just like that, over a few stupid texts?”

I couldn’t believe the sheer, unadulterated nerve of him. I wasn’t the one throwing our life away; he was. He was the one who had decided that four years of marriage and a beautiful home weren’t enough. He was the one who had chosen to chase cheap thrills from a stranger while I was upstairs sleeping, or downstairs steaming his fucking shirts.

‘‘Don’t you dare try to pin this on me,’’ I snapped, my voice shaking with a dangerous mixture of tears and rage. ‘‘You ended our marriage the exact second you decided to send those messages.’’

I lunged back toward the bed and struggled with the zipper of his oversized suitcase, aggressively forcing it shut even though stray sleeves of his designer shirts and cashmere sweaters were hanging out of the seams. I didn’t bother tucking them in. I didn’t care if they got ruined; he was Sandra’s problem now. With a sharp yank, I hoisted the heavy bag off the mattress and marched past him, refusing to give him the satisfaction of seeing the tears finally spilling over my eyelashes.

Behind me, I heard the soft rustle of the mattress as Rufus scrambled down. The steady, comforting click-click-click of his nails against the hardwood floor followed close at my heels. My beautiful golden boy was loyal to the absolute core. It was a pathetic shame my husband didn’t possess a fraction of the same heart.

The suitcase was loud—bang, bang, bang—as it hit every step behind me on the stairs, leaving small scuffs in the white paint that I would gladly scrub away later. I reached the front door and swung it open so wide it crashed against the stopper. Behind me, the heavy, panicked footsteps of Colby’s designer dress shoes hurried down the stairs, trying to catch up to the dog and me. My muscles felt weak, my arms trembling under the weight of the luggage, but I was too far gone to stop now. I gripped the handle with both hands, swung the suitcase forward with all the momentum I had left, and launched it out into the freezing December air, letting it tumble roughly across the concrete driveway.

It felt good to be bad, even if my chest was tight and my heart was racing.

“Unbelievable.” Colby said, under his breath, , stepping into the foyer.

He reached over to the coat rack, pulled his expensive, tailored charcoal wool coat off the hook, and slipped into it with practiced, elegant ease. He stepped right into my personal space, standing close enough in the open doorway that I could feel the familiar warmth radiating off his body, mixed with the expensive cologne he had worn for years. He stared down at me, his handsome features contorting into a look of heartbreak. It was a masterful performance—the trembling lower lip, the softened gaze—but my eyes had finally been opened, and I wasn’t buying the act anymore.

“I’m not letting you go, Han,” he whispered, his voice cracking perfectly on cue. “I love you. We can fix this.”

I didn’t say a word. I just clenched my jaw, stood my ground on the welcome mat, and stared blankly ahead, waiting for him to finally cross the threshold and leave. After a long, agonizingly awkward silence where the only sound was the whistling winter wind, Colby finally realized the door wasn’t going to slam shut with him on the inside. He turned and walked down the steps toward his sleek sedan. He bent down and hoisted the suitcase off the ground, the expensive, woven fabric already rapidly soaking up the moisture and road salt from the driveway.

He tossed it carelessly into the back seat and shut the car door with a loud, resounding thud that echoed through the quiet neighborhood. Before opening the driver’s side door, he paused and looked back at me one last time across the roof of the vehicle. “I’ll come back tomorrow afternoon,” he said, his voice dropping into a steady, patronizingly calm tone. “Maybe we can actually talk like adults once you’ve had some time to calm down.”

Calm down! How dare he!

‘‘Don’t bother.’’ I snapped, snapped across the yard, the cold air biting at my throat. ‘‘I’ll be too busy celebrating my new life to open the door.’’

The subtle shift in his green eyes told me everything I needed to know—he didn’t believe a syllable of it. He fully expected me to spend the weekend hiding under the weighted blankets, drinking cheap Pinot Grigio straight from the bottle, crying over old photo albums, and watching Bridget Jones on repeat. He couldn’t even fathom the concept of me existing, let alone surviving, without him. He thought I was weak. He thought I was broken.

He was completely wrong.

There’s an old saying: Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. Well… Colby was about to find out exactly what that meant.

~~~

SIX MONTHS LATER.

It was Friday. Finally!

I had zero plans, and that was exactly how I wanted it. A bottle of wine was chilling in the fridge, and a movie was already paused on the TV. I walked into my dimly lit kitchen and pulled out a cold bottle of Pinot Grigio.

Right next to it was a slice of cheesecake, still in its container from the store. I’d picked it up on my way home, deciding that tonight, I was skipping dinner and going straight to dessert.

“Come to Mama.” I whispered, sliding the cake out of the fridge.

I carried everything—the cake, the wine, and a tall glass—into the living room like a teenager sneaking a snack. I set them down on the glass coffee table next to my Yankee Candle. The scent of “Cashmere” filled the air, one of my favorites alongside vanilla and baby powder.

I filled my glass halfway, then added a generous splash more—because why the fuck not? I turned the lights down low and curled up on the couch under a fuzzy blanket. Rufus was already in position on his bed, ready to catch the cheesecake crumbs.

I hit play and leaned back, taking a big gulp of wine as the opening credits rolled. There she was—Bridget Jones, back on my screen for the third Friday in a row. I finally felt myself relax, lost in the familiar scenes of my favorite movie.

I was at the halfway point— the scene where Bridget finds a naked woman hiding in Daniel Cleaver’s bathroom and finally walks away. It always reminds me of the cheating scumbag I kicked out 6 months ago. Which was exactly why this movie was now paired with a bottle of Pinot instead of chocolate and popcorn.

Just as I was sinking into the drama, the house next door exploded with noise. Music was blaring so loud I could feel it through the floorboards.

“What the hell?” I muttered, sitting up.

To my left lived Doris, an eighty-nine-year-old sweetheart who’d been tucked into bed for hours. We’re close, so I knew her routine by heart. But the house on the other side—where the music was currently thumping—was a different story. That place had been vacant for the better part of a year.

Who the hell is over there?

I grabbed the remote and jammed the volume button, trying to drown out the noise. It was like the person on the other side of the wall could feel me fighting back, because the music only got louder. My floorboards started to vibrate, and my patience finally hit its limit.

“That’s it!” I snapped, tossing the remote onto the cushions and standing up.

My fuzzy blanket slid to the floor, but I didn’t bother picking it up. I shoved my feet into my pink flamingo slippers and marched toward the front door with Rufus trailing behind me. Yes, I said flamingo slippers. They were a “breakup gift” from my best friend, Lucy, after Colby and I split. They are totally hideous, but at the moment, I didn’t care. I was too fueled by Pinot and spite to worry about my fashion choices.

I grabbed a cardigan from the hook and threw it on over my t-shirt and blue-and-white striped pants. My hair, a chaotic mix of brown and blonde waves, was yanked into a bun that definitely wasn’t “Pinterest-cute.” Between the stripes, the cardigan, and the flamingo slippers, I was a walking disaster—but I was a furious walking disaster.

The night air was crisp, and the second it hit my face, I realized the Pinot was hitting me too. I felt a bit lightheaded, but the anger was still there. I turned toward the noise. For the first time in months, the house next door wasn’t dark. A car was parked out front, and every window seemed to be blazing with light.

I marched up the driveway and planted myself in front of the bright red door, the Pinot in my system giving me a boost of “don’t-mess-with-me” energy. I held my finger on the doorbell, ringing it in a long, annoying streak until my point was made. I crossed my arms, my face set in a scowl, waiting for whoever was inside to realize their welcome-to-the-neighborhood party was officially over.

I was leaning in to give the bell one last aggressive jab when the handle turned. The door pulled back, and I found myself face-to-face with the source of the noise.

The door swung open to reveal a guy who looked far too put-together for this time of night. He looked around my age, maybe early thirties, with a mess of thick, dark hair that looked deliberately tousled and a shadow of a dark beard framing a sharp, stubborn jawline. He was wearing a tight charcoal-grey t-shirt that didn’t leave much to the imagination regarding his broad chest and heavily muscled arms, paired with slim-fitting black jeans that looked effortlessly expensive.

This is the asshole. The one responsible for the bass currently rattling my teeth.

“Turn it down.” I demanded, crossing my arms tightly over my chest and completely bypassing any semblance of a polite introduction.

He just stood there in the brightly lit doorway, blinking slowly as his gaze traveled down to my feet and back up again, his brow furrowing into a confused frown. My temper flared. I stepped closer, crossing the threshold just enough to make sure he felt the full brunt of my hostility, my plush flamingo slippers practically vibrating against the welcome mat with absolute anger.

“The music—shut it off. Now.”

The man turned his back on me without a word and disappeared inside. The silence that followed was instant and amazing. Finally! I stood my ground, waiting for him to come back and apologize.

He didn’t look the least bit sorry when he reappeared a moment later, leaning casually against the doorframe as if he had all the time in the world. He stopped dead in the center of the doorway, his dark eyes sweeping deliberately over my oversized, faded striped pajama bottoms before halting at the bright pink, plush birds on my feet. The slow, infuriatingly confident smirk that spread across his face made my blood boil instantly.

“That’s one hell of an outfit, neighbor,” he drawled, his voice a low, gravelly rumble that lingered just a second too long on the ridiculous flamingos.

“Funny. I didn’t realize ‘moving in’ involved vibrating my floorboards at midnight.” I replied, my voice cold.

He let out a low, amused huff, shifting his weight so that his shoulder brushed the wooden frame, looking entirely unbothered by my hostility. “My bad. I didn’t know the walls in these places were paper-thin. Next time I’ll keep the ‘disturbing the peace’ to a minimum—unless, of course, you want to come inside and pick the next track? You look like you’re about one drink away from actually having some real fun.’’

I felt the heat rise in my cheeks. The nerve of this man, standing at a door he’d owned for all of five minutes, completely unbothered by the fact that he was ruining my sanity, and having the audacity to tell me how to have fun.

“I was having plenty of fun until you decided to turn my living room into a low-rent nightclub,” I snapped, my fingers tightening into white-knuckled fists against the fabric of my oversized cardigan. “Keep the music down, or the next person knocking on your door won’t be wearing flamingo slippers.”

I didn’t wait for his comeback. I didn’t want to see if that smirk got wider or if he had another clever remark waiting. I turned around and marched back down his driveway, the gravel crunching loudly under my rubber soles. I could feel his eyes on my back the entire way, and I hated that I was suddenly very aware of the blue-and-white stripes on my legs.