A Fragile Enchantment

by Allison Saft

“The only happiness you can imagine for the people you care about comes at your own expense. You’re making yourself miserable, and don’t try to deny it. You are the most obvious, transparent person I’ve met in my entire life.”

Whatever you think you have to prove or earn, it’s all in your head. Your existence alone is enough.

He’d trusted her with his heart. And for those hazy, delirious hours, he’d convinced her that she mattered enough to take something for herself.

He’d lost so much, but she very much doubted he’d allowed himself to grieve at all. He’d only immediately set to work filling in the gaps left behind.

But she supposed she was forever cursed to long for things she could not have.

You have to choose your own happiness, whatever that looks like. You can’t live your life for other people.”

“I don’t need your protection.” She very much did. But she would not give him the satisfaction of that admission.

Desperation sometimes makes people act in ways they regret,”

You don’t have to hurt yourself because someone else hurt you.’

I knew then I had a choice. I was either going to die there, or I was going to live out of spite.”

“I’m still here, by some miracle. I still don’t know how to be vulnerable. I still don’t know how to live with myself most days.

I am inelegant and silly and—and I will make a mess of everything.

“You may be the only good thing I’ve ever wanted.”

She had always believed life was what slipped through her fingers while she was idle. That life was something she wasted, not something she had.

Everything was falling to pieces around them, but here, with him, she stood within the eye of a hurricane.

Growing up in a household still reeling from so much loss, she’d always been attuned to anger, all the ways to make herself small to avoid it, to weave between its volleys.

She couldn’t quell this quiet, desperate fury burning within her. If she was to die young, why should she live pleasing everyone but herself?

It had happened. Niamh had always imagined love as something sparkling, something all-encompassing and glorious as daybreak, as sudden as a knife to the heart. But love was somehow more magical and more banal than she’d dreamed it. It crept up on her, out of sight, until it was completely undeniable—until it was already out of her mouth and solid as a stone to strike her down with.

“Stop criticizing yourself and undercutting your own achievements. Stop cutting off pieces of yourself, when you’re already more than good enough.”

your compassion and patience for others more so. You make things lighter wherever you go.”

“How can I possibly live for my own happiness, when I have so little of it left? How can that possibly be meaningful, when my family is counting on me?” “Because it’s not meaningful to kill yourself little by little to make people happy!”

“Nothing is guaranteed, Niamh. We all die. You and I are dying right now, but we’re also alive. Love is what makes life worth living. Love is what makes us act when we most need to. That’s what your legacy is. It’s how you love the people around you, not how much you’ve sacrificed for them.”

He’d protected her as if it were as ingrained in him as breathing.

Tomorrow, he couldn’t waver any longer. He did not have to love her as she loved him. But he deserved, for once in his life, a chance to build a life on his own terms. He deserved a second chance to take his own advice. She would give him one.

“But if there is one thing I’ve learned, it’s that making yourself miserable to please others isn’t worth it. You deserve to live on your own terms.”

“I don’t know about that. I think you’re more like a weed.” He made a sound she wasn’t sure was a laugh. “Is that supposed to make me feel better?” “Yes! Weeds are … tenacious. They survive against the odds, wherever they land, no matter how many times you cut them down. And sometimes they can be quite beautiful.”

“Oh, you’re terrible!” she cried. “I’m trying to be romantic. Let’s see you do better.” He frowned, clearly unable to back down from even the most ridiculous challenge. “You’re like … a flower. Too delicate for this world.”