No, We Can't Be Friends

by Sophie Ranald

Don’t waste the best years of your life on a man who’ll only ever love himself. Don’t let it destroy you like it has me.’

But back then, it had never crossed my mind that it might one day be necessary to unpick the tapestry of our life, separate the threads that were mine from those that were his, and try to roll them up again into tidy skeins, ready to be crafted into something new.

I wouldn’t have to wash anyone else’s clothes, or cook anyone else’s dinner or pick up anyone else’s dry cleaning or write birthday cards for any fucker who wasn’t my own family.