He sees me. Before him, I don’t know if I believed in love—not really. I believed in the idea of it, the way it could hurt people, but I didn’t believe I would truly feel it, or that I deserved it anyway. Every step of the way, James has shown me I do deserve it, that I deserve someone like him, someone good and devoted who makes my heart sing whenever I see him. Someone who makes me feel like I’m worth something more than the life I resigned myself to when I was a teenager. Someone who pushes me and protects me and holds me when I cry.
