Expiration Dates

by Rebecca Serle

It’s hard to hold on to people the older we get. Life looks different for everyone, and you have to keep choosing one another. You have to make a conscious effort to say, over and over again, “You.” Not everyone makes that choice. Not everyone can.

I try not to think about aging. At least, not aging in relationships. Part of the beauty of the paper is that it allows me to be present. To not plan ahead too far, not further than specified. Until now.

The ocean was alive, then. I remember thinking if I just swam out far enough I could reach the crease where the water meets the sky. I could touch the horizon, run my hand along its smooth edge.

When do we stop believing in the things we do? And why does it happen so slowly instead of all at once?

But sometimes I’m afraid it means I’m somehow fading—that all the bright and brilliant aspects of myself are diminishing in this cocoon. That I will not have the sparkle I once had—that all my edges are being worn down in this intimacy.

I liked school—I liked the structure of it; I thrived off the predictable rhythm and pace. The energy.

The Hotel Bel-Air is tucked away in the hills of Los Angeles; it’s an airy, stunning getaway for the rich and famous—or

His confidence sometimes felt like a bulldozer, but other times it felt like a foundation—like I was tethered to something that could not possibly bend or snap or break.

His personality made me feel safe, being in his orbit was like being inside the sun—the rays couldn’t harm me, all I felt was the warmth of proximity.

I have a heart condition.” I had told so few people the truth in my life, but I had said those words so frequently. To new doctors, to nurses drawing blood, to teachers, administrators, once, to the postman about a particularly heavy Amazon box. But I had never told someone I might love.

The almighty Hugo was speechless, because he couldn’t deal with this. Of course he couldn’t. It’s too big for anyone; that’s why I tell no one.

Flext’s office was incredibly close-knit—everyone was friends. It felt halfway between pulling an all-nighter in college and summer camp. Both things I had, confessionally, enjoyed. I loved the energy of it. Whole hours would go by where I’d forget the past two years.

“You’re very interesting,” he said. “You don’t seem to have a whole lot of fear. Me on the other hand, I’m basically living in a Hitchcock movie.”

“I just,” he said. “She’s the one.” What I knew then was this: he had clearly been in love with her the whole time. I didn’t know if it was betrayal, but I knew it didn’t feel good. Suddenly this bubble I’d created for myself—one without heartache—burst. I wasn’t the anonymous feel-good girl from LA. I was a girl with a history, and he was a man who couldn’t let go of his.

“I’m happy for you, then,” I said. I didn’t mean it. But I wanted to be mature. I wanted to, somehow, right the ship again. To put myself back in the driver’s seat, to not feel at the mercy of someone else. I wanted to be in control.

palm. I thought about what it would feel like to be that cherished, to be that chosen, and for the first time in my life, I knew I wanted it. I wanted epic love, the kind that’s reserved for the movies. I wanted someone to speak about me the way I knew Josh spoke about Emily.

I often wonder what our responsibility is to other people, how much we owe them. Whose job is it to look out for our own happiness. Us, or the people who love us? It’s both, of course. We owe ourselves and each other. But in what order?

We have to be cracked open sometimes. We have to be cracked open sometimes to let anything good in. What I see now, emerging in the mirror, is this one, simple truth: learning to be broken is learning to be whole.

“I used to dread the morning because it meant I had to rush out of the house. Then I realized even if I can’t make the day longer, I can make the morning earlier,” he said.

I never became a morning person. I was only ever awake to see the sunrise during those few hazy years. But now I think maybe I’ve been missing out. Maybe he’s onto something.

“That’s what we do for our children. We wish it were us.” I feel the warmth of his strong and steady palms. “But the thing is, Daphne. No one’s time is promised. Not yours. Not Mom’s. Not mine. Not Jake’s. It’s just the way it is. We are all dying. Every day. And at some point it becomes a choice. Which one are you going to do today? Are you living or are you dying?”

“All I wish for you, for any of us, is to do the living one. To do it to the fullest. For as long as it lasts.”

thought if I had all the answers, if I was always one step ahead, if I knew my hand, then I’d never lose. But being surprised by life isn’t losing, it’s living. It’s messy and uncomfortable and complicated and beautiful. It’s life, all of it. The only way to get it wrong is to refuse to play.

“She would tell me all the time that the love we had mattered, that it could catch you, that it was catching you.” He shakes his head. I see his mouth move, uneven, overcome. “So, no, he cannot give you forty more years, but, baby, love is the most powerful force we’ve got. If you think protection isn’t in its jurisdiction, you’re wrong.”

once read that there are more stars in the sky than there are grains of sand on earth. It seemed impossible. It always seems impossible to believe the things we cannot see.

My life has been filled with magical moments, I was just so busy waiting I didn’t see them when they were here.

We are powerful because we affect each other’s stories, all of us. We are here to impact each other, to knock into each other, to throw each other off-balance, sometimes even off track.

I think even if there’s not a reason for everything, there may be a reason for everyone.

am all at once bowled over by the reality that there are still new stories to tell. That not everything is known or explored. That there are great and wondrous things ahead. That nothing is promised and yet, and yet…