June First

by Jennifer Hartmann

He turned the only girl I’ve ever wanted into the only girl I can never have. But I still love her. I still love her in all those other ways—all those precious, pure, good ways. And I just have to hope that the rotten love doesn’t spoil all the rest.

I’m hopelessly, irrevocably in love with you, June Bailey. The desperate, aching kind of love. The kind there’s no coming back from. The kind there’s no way out of. The kind that’s going to be the death of me one day. I fall more in love with June than I ever thought possible as we clutch each other in a moonlit graveyard on her eighteenth birthday, with my mother on my mind and the scent of sweet desserts dancing in the air.

“You’re not responsible for the way others react to what you need to do to get better.”

“I probably shouldn’t be saying this, but the thought of another man putting his hands on you makes me borderline murderous.”

“There are worse things than loving the wrong person. And that’s losing them.”

“It felt like I’d give my dying breath just to have one more weak moment with you.”

“I don’t want to chase my dream because it’s not a dream without you in it.”

“She was supposed to be Theo’s sister and we were going to grow up together as neighbors. I would’ve just been a regular boy who had a crush on a regular girl, and that boy would have fallen in love with that girl the right way.”

I’ve always put June first. She’s always put me first. And I hope, I pray, I beg, That someday… We’ll finally be able to put us first.

Just as we cannot force ourselves to love someone, we cannot force ourselves to unlove them either. Fate can be foolish, and fate can be careless. But fate is always true.