“Why are you following me?” I ask, then immediately cringe. I sound way harsher than I mean to. “Not that I mind really, it’s just, you don’t know me.”

“I’m here to help.”

“Help me what?”

Ross lets out a sigh, and it’s the most dramatic sigh I’ve ever heard. It’s got layers somehow, with a gentle rush at the end that sounds like a beach break.

“You’re not going to make this easy, are you? I’m here to help with this.” He waves his hand all around my body. “With whatever’s going on with you.”

“With whatever’s going on with me? I’m not the one who doesn’t know how to cross a street!”

Ross simply puts his hands on his hips.

I hate this tactic. I don’t like silence. It’s the one thing Ms. Molina says I need to work on in my film projects. I don’t know how to just let my characters be and say things by not saying anything at all. Not that any of that matters anymore since I’m not so sure directing rom-coms should be my end goal. Would perpetuating the Happily Ever After just be setting other hopeless romantics like me up for heartbreak when the love of their life ends up leaving them?

Ross keeps standing in silence with a look that says I know you’re keeping something from me, and I cave.

“Okay, I may have been dumped recently.”

That scowl on Ross’s face comes back. I think it’s the most natural position for his face.

“You were taken to a trash removal site?”

How does he not know what I’m talking about?

“Dumped,” I repeat. “Like, broken up with.”

“You broke something?” Ross says. “Should we take you to a hospital?”

It’s so absurd that I Donkey Laugh, which only makes Ross scowl more. “No, broken up with, like, by my boyfriend.” The laugh instantly falls from my voice. It really pours salt in the wound to have to explain what it means to be dumped. “As in, he no longer wants to be in a relationship with me. You have to tell me more about where you grew up in Indiana. Does no one get dumped where you’re from?”

“No, right, dumped.” Ross says it like he was always up to speed. “Separated. Finished. Over.”

Ouch, ouch, and ouch. “You don’t have to keep defining it.”

“My bad,” he says.

And then he just stares again, I guess waiting for me to go on.