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3 Midweek Longreads: "It was clear we had probably been a mistake from the beginning"

Longreads to savour or save.

IF YOU WANT a juicy longread to sink your teeth into, you’ve come to the right place.

Here are three to save for a moment of peace, or devour straight away.

1. A love story

Julio Rodriquez was a ladies man like no other when he met Dolores Batista. But he fell hard, and the two – after some false starts – eventually settled into a life of love together.

(New York Times, 10 mins)

They are not married, but might as well be. He refers to her as “my wife” and said he liked the way they fit together when they held hands. She wears a wedding ring he bought for her four years ago, even though she turned down his proposal.

2. Sexts and drugs and rock n’roll

Ellen Cushing goes on the road with DigiTour, a trip with the hugely famous social media celebrities beloved of teens.

(Buzzfeed, 42 mins)

First, there’s homeroom (introductions), lunchtime (food fight), cheerleading practice (a goofy, strutty dance sequence set to Gwen Stefani’s “Hollaback Girl”). And then, of course, the denouement: prom, during which six girls and one boy are plucked from the audience and matched with a cast member for an onstage slow dance set to Wiz Khalifa’s summer funeral banger “See You Again.”

3. Last night a great chef saved my life

Brett Martin was in the throes of a terrible break-up when he went to visit the renowned chef Jacques Pépin. Turns out that Pépin taught him more in one meeting than he could possibly imagine.

(GQ, 28 mins)

It had been a bad breakup. We had lived together for three years, a first for both of us, which may have fueled our fever to stick to it long after it was clear we had probably been a mistake from the beginning. By then, our needs and dependencies had locked as neatly as pieces of a jigsaw puzzle, a perverse compatibility that eventually turned to reinforcing and confirming the worst suspicions of each about the other.

Love longreads? Check out Sitdown Sunday every week>