There should be an Olympic medal for surviving modern breakups.

Bronze if you don’t text them after two glasses of wine.

Silver if you don’t stalk their Instagram.

Gold if you don’t accidentally send them a TikTok three months later because your thumb slipped.

And platinum? Platinum is deleting their Netflix profile without feeling anything.

I deserve absolutely none of these medals.

My name is Mia Laurent. I’m twenty-seven years old, recently dumped, and currently wearing an oversized Taylor Swift hoodie while eating Nutella directly from the jar with what I hope is yesterday’s spoon.

I live in New York City in a one-bedroom apartment that costs more money than my parents paid for their entire house in Italy.

Life is beautiful.

Three months ago, my boyfriend of four years dumped me over text.

Not even a phone call.

Not even a FaceTime.

An actual text message.

Eleven words.

“I think we’re different people now. You deserve someone better.”

Someone better.

Men love saying that when they have already found someone hotter.

It should honestly be illegal.

You don’t get to emotionally murder someone and then compliment them in the same sentence.

Naturally, I handled the breakup with dignity and grace.

By dignity and grace, I mean I cried in Sephora because our favourite song started playing while I was trying foundation number 42.

Three months later, I had finally started feeling human again.

Then came Thursday.

Thursday should honestly be cancelled.

I was peacefully scrolling through Instagram while pretending to work when my best friend Chloe sent me a message.

CHLOE: DON’T PANIC.

The fact that every dramatic event in my life begins with “don’t panic” should concern me more than it currently does.

ME: Why?

CHLOE: Jason has a girlfriend.

Silence.

Nothing.

No emotions whatsoever.

I had spent months mentally preparing for this moment.

I was mature.

I was healed.

I was thriving.

ME: Cool.

CHLOE: She’s really pretty.

Never in the history of humanity has anything good followed those four words.

Five minutes later I found myself staring at her Instagram profile.

Three hundred and seventeen thousand followers.

Of course.

She was a travel photographer.

Of course.

She volunteered at animal shelters.

Of course she fucking did.

She had a golden retriever.

OF COURSE SHE DID.

Her smile looked like she moisturised twice a day and forgave people who cut her off in traffic.

I hated her immediately.

Then something terrible happened.

I liked her.

No.

More than liked.

I became fascinated.

She wasn’t just pretty. She was funny. Weird. Slightly chaotic. She collected vintage cameras and accidentally adopted old cats from shelters because “they deserve retirement too.”

Who does that?

Psychopaths and Disney princesses.

I spent six hours scrolling through her Instagram.

Six hours.

That’s longer than some relationships in Los Angeles.

By midnight I knew:

* her favourite wine * her star sign * her favourite sushi restaurant * that she cried watching Pixar movies * that she named her plants after Harry Potter characters

Worst of all?

She seemed genuinely happy.

And Jason looked happier than I had ever seen him.

Which is objectively rude.

At precisely 1:43 AM I turned towards my best friend and said the words that would change my life forever.

“I think I’d actually be friends with her.”

Chloe stared at me in horror.

“You’ve officially lost your mind.”

Perhaps I had.

Or perhaps every great friendship begins with accidentally stalking someone’s social media for six consecutive hours.

Little did I know, two weeks later I would meet my ex-boyfriend’s new girlfriend.

And somehow…

she would become one of my favourite people in the world.

The only problem?

Neither of us knew who the other one was.

And Jason was about to have the worst month of his entire life.

Welcome to Your Ex’s New Girlfriend.

Someone new entered the group chat.