ONCE IN A VERY BLUE MOON

Sarah was a terrible drunk in public but a much better one in private where she could control her secret descent into despair without drawing attention to herself. She knew only too well about her friends' warnings of drinking alone, but with her heart all broken in a thousand pieces lately, she settled down with a bottle of 'Jack' and blasted the Spotify heartbreak playlist she'd made for herself in what she drunkenly believed was an uncanny and prescient act of anticipating her recent personal disaster with Chris. The truth was, however, she'd compiled the compilation after her last heartbreak with Hal back in 2016.

Now December had arrived without warning and Sarah's 2023 was drawing to a tragic, whimpering close. Today marked the two month 'annex'versary since Chris had left Sarah and yet the wound of his leaving her still felt twenty four hours fresh. Every piece of advice she'd been offered by her female consiglieres she'd ignored. Instead, she had resorted impulsively to endlessly texting Chris and leaving rambling, late night messages to his answer phone, desperately pleading with him to return to her, though it was becoming increasingly obvious he was gone for good and had most probably permanently blocked her.

Turning up the volume of her music so she could drown out the endless negative mind chatter that was threatening to sink her entire sense of remaining self-worth, Sarah sang loud and off-key, oblivious to the shouts of 'turn it down' from her irate neighbours next door.

Maybe it was the drink that had made Sarah forget the strange writing exercise her local breakup group had encouraged her to carry out a few weeks previous as she stared at the pristine, unopened letter on the mantelpiece above her fire place believing/hoping it might actually be from Chris. As long as it remained unopened it would be. Singing along to a letter themed song on her 'heartbreak' playlist which she was convinced was serendipity, Sarah belted her broken heart out as she built up her courage to read the contents inside.

I found your letter in my mailbox today
You were just checkin' if I was okay
And if I still miss you
Well you know what they say

Just once in a very blue moon
Just once in a very blue moon
Just once in a very blue moon
And I feel one comin' on soon

Finally, after the song had finished, she ripped the envelope open and the delusion it would be from Chris was instantly dispelled due to the messily scrawled note in unfamilar handwriting. She then remembered in her drunken haze that all the members of the breakup group had agreed to write 'imaginary' letters from each one of their exes to one another in a bid to create some type of collective catharsis.

"For fuck's sake!'

And then, after a few moments reflecting on the bitter disappointment, Sarah laughed for the first time in weeks at the sheer absurdity of the surprise twist. She continued to read the 'pretend' letter from Chris, that was really written by Dan, her 'breakup buddy'.

Dear Sarah,

It's a shame we couldn't fix each other while we were together but sometimes two broken things are simply too utterly fucked to help the other.

Here's hoping we can fix ourselves now we have space and distance from one another. Who knows, perhaps one day we'll congratulate ourselves on how well we both turned out after our break-up!

Chin up!

Chris (Dan)

"Hah! Dan, you stupid doughnut!"

And with that, Sarah scrumpled the letter and flung it on the fire, forgetting it was an electric replica.

"Fuck!"

Ever since she'd been young, Sarah had always been bad at quitting things (most famously her dummy), and now it had been Chris which probably explained why he was finally the one who'd had to carry out the deed even though she'd known for months that the relationship had been beyond toxic.

Her sister Ellie had warned her to learn from the mistakes of her past relationships this time and not throw herself into yet another shit situation like some sort of 'relationship Groundhog'. Nevertheless, scrolling with an amused look on her face through her phone contact list and still laughing at the letter penned from her 'breakup buddy', Sarah decided to give Dan a call and see what he was up to for Christmas.