But why can't my brain stop thinking about how good his lips would feel against mine. Even just thinking about it has me all hot and flustered.
Stupid hormones! I shake myself to rid the thoughts from my brain. What the heck is wrong with me!
I walk to the fridge, reach in to grab a cold bottle of beer and as I close the door, something catches my eye.
On the outside of the fridge door are a bunch of alphabet magnets scattered amongst a few of those ugly holiday souvenirs you get given by friends and family when they've been on holiday. I run my hand over the photograph, pinned to the door by an orange letter 'L'.
The photo was taken at my twenty-first birthday party, mum had booked an expensive restaurant and asked one of the waitresses to take a rare picture of the whole family together. Me, Lexi and dad are huddled together pulling faces and mum is sitting with a scowl on her face, refusing to lower herself to our standards enough to have one little moment of fun.
Honestly, it should have been a sign that everything was going to fall apart but it was back when times were simpler, and I thought my life was perfect. When I had the perfect family, the perfect boyfriend and my whole perfect future planned out ahead of me.
Oh, how things have changed.
My once perfect family is now a broken mess, and the boyfriend turned out to be a cheating, lying scum bag who took my future away from me the moment I walked in on him and some tramp.
Rage boils up in me as the vision of him ploughing into the raven-headed underwear model loop in my head — my house, my man, my bed. The look on his face when he realised, I'd caught him red-handed and figured out his affair wasn't a one-time thing was priceless.
The worse thing is, I spent five years with him, waiting for a proposal that never came and after only one month of me moving out, she is living in the house we made together.
It's got to be a phase though. I know he'll come to his senses eventually and realise we're meant to be. We're soul mates.
Trying to shake the images of the Instagram post that broke my heart all over again, I decide to take a quick shower and get an early night.
The earlier soaked material of my suit is now rigid and rough against my soft skin as I tear it away from my body as quickly as possible and step into the bath, moving myself underneath the shower head attached to the wall.
Cold water spills out making me shiver, then a few seconds later, warmth flows over my body, washing away the remains of a terrible day.
After my shower, still alone in the apartment, curiosity gets the better of me and I fall down the rabbit hole that is Ethan Brooks.
I know from my interview research — which wasn't very extensive — that the fights are something I struggle to watch. I've always been a bit of a wimp when it comes to bodily fluids and every highlight reel that I've seen so far is a bloody war.
Looking for something a little less like a scene from Carrie and making the decision not to stalk my ex’s new girlfriend on social media looking for a way to bring him back to me, I turn to Google.
For the next hour or so, I read all about the tragic death of Ethan's wife and the loss of his parents when he was younger.
I even start to feel sorry for the guy a little, thinking that maybe I misjudged him, but it doesn’t take long for the bubble to burst when I read about the time he was arrested for starting a brawl outside a night club, putting two people in hospital and the numerous women he's been pictured leaving swanky parties with on a regular basis and I realise that he is exactly like I imagined.
Feeling a little deflated, I default to what has quickly become my new normal and curl up on the sofa with Mr. Gosling and a family sized bar of chocolate.
The cold wakes me in the early hours as the realisation that my bedding is still on the corner table sets in. Half asleep, I fumble around, pull out the sofa bed mattress and try to lay the blankets down for me to crawl back into.
Just as I'm about to drift back off to sleep, I notice the Netflix title screen for The Notebook, my favourite movie in the world glaring at me. Wondering what I have to do to find a man that loves me as much as Noah loved Allie, I turn it off, close my eyes and drift off to sleep, continuing to toss and turn for the rest of the night
I'm wide awake when the alarm finally goes off at seven-thirty. The chorus of birds outside soothing my anxiety as I realise that Lexi still isn't home yet.
A little worried, I reach for the table and after feeling around for a minute, I finally feel the cold glass of my phone. Hopefully, she's either stayed at a friend's or gone home with one of the guys she knows but I text her just to be sure.
Feeling tension in my muscles and a dull ache behind my eyes, I decide to take my mind off her absence by going about my usual morning routine. I clear the crumpled bedding from the sofa and place it in a neatly folded pile on the table, pour myself a black coffee, eat breakfast and then
