The light of the spotlights pops, I’m sweating in my dress on the stage. “Well, which one of you has a really bad break-up story up your sleeve besides me?” I ask the audience. Ex, the book I’m on the reading tour with calls for more confessions. Every evening a copy of the book goes to the best story, the audience decides. An arm immediately shoots up. It belongs to a red-haired woman, maybe late twenties, from what I can tell in the dark. Let’s call her Annette.

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