Too Late

by Colleen Hoover

I read once that the difference between an extrovert and an introvert isn’t how you act in a group setting. It’s whether or not those group settings give you fuel or drain you. An introvert can outwardly appear to others to be an extrovert, and vice versa. But it all comes down to how those interactions influence you internally.

“Love finds you in the forgiveness at the tail end of a fight. Love finds you in the empathy you feel for someone else. Love finds you in the embrace that follows a tragedy. Love finds you in the celebration after the conquering of an illness. Love finds you in the devastation after the surrender to an illness.”

Sometimes Brady’s mom writes notes and puts them inside his lunchbox. He reads them all to us and he laughs because he thinks they’re dumb. I never laugh, though. I don’t think the notes are dumb. One time I saw one of the notes he threw in the trash and I picked it up. It said, “Dear Brady: I love you! Have a great day at school!” I tore the top of the note off that had Brady’s name on it and I kept it. I pretended my mother wrote it for me and sometimes I would read it. But that was a long time ago and I lost the note recently. That’s why I wanted to go to school today, because if Brady had another note from his mom, I wanted to steal it and pretend it was for me again. I wonder how it would feel to have someone say those words to me.