More on this book
Community
Kindle Notes & Highlights
Read between
February 24 - February 27, 2025
The sound of waves drowns out all others, as if we’re inside a bubble, a ship floating through the cosmos, the two of us alone.
I squeeze her hand four times. I’ll. Keep. You. Safe.
“I’ve decided that you are good for me. You’ve changed me more—made me better—in one month than anyone else in my whole life. You make me feel free. You make me feel beautiful and safe and smart, and that makes me want to kiss you.”
Her lips taste like finding faith, like realizing you believe in God for the very first time.
“Leo,” she breathes. “Stop looking at me like that.” “Looking at you like what, honeysuckle?” “Like you know exactly what my soul feels like, and you’ve been incomplete without it all this time.”
“For what it’s worth, I really did love you,” I whisper. “My word is worthless…but I loved you too.”
“You’d wait a whole year just for me to come back?” “I think I might wait my whole life for you to come back, Darby. Something tells me there would be no point in trying to move on from this because I’d end up searching for you in every place I go. In every person I meet. Aimlessly wandering until I find you again.”
“You have to promise me something, though, honeysuckle.” “Anything,” I whisper. “When you go back to Kansas, you need to promise me that if you’re ever feeling unsafe, if you’re ever feeling like you’re about to break, about to lose yourself completely, you call me. Text me. Email me. Send letter by messenger pigeon. I don’t fucking care.
You’re not just the honey, Darby. You’re the whole damn flower. Do not forget you have poison berries. You have strength, resilience, and an independent mind.
“Day or night. If you need me, I’m there. No questions asked. I’m always going to protect you. Until the end of time.”
my eyes are snagged by the thin chain around his neck and the unmistakable gold ring looped through it, hanging at the center of his chest, pressing against the tattoo across his heart. There is no way.
“An angel. An angel and her demon.” I close the gap between us once more, feathering my lips over his. “A honeysuckle and her heathen.”
“It represented a piece of you that would always belong to me. If I couldn’t have you. If I never got to see you again. If you…” He sighs. “If you went on to marry someone else, love someone else, give the rest of yourself to another person…” He reaches up to grab the ring hanging at his chest. “I’d have this. I’d have this piece of you, this reminder that at one point and time, you were mine. It’s a reminder that I know what love is. That I have been loved, even if I’m not anymore.”
“Stop looking at me like that,” he whispers. “Like what?” “Like I own all the pieces of your soul. Like you’ve been incomplete all this time without them.”
The next time you want to refer to yourself as engaged, you let me know, because the only person you’re marrying in this life is me.”
“Tell me it’s not my fault.”
“We’re gonna be okay, honeysuckle.” I brush a piece of hair from her forehead. “We’ll heal together.”
“You’re my ‘it for me’ person. You were my first love. Then, the one who got away. Now, you’re my ‘it was always you.’ And it doesn’t matter what happened in between, because you’re gonna be my forever person too.” He cups my face, bringing his mouth to mine. “You’re my once-in-a-lifetime kind of love, Darby.”
I see everything in those blue eyes. I see the first sparks of love, the first comfort I’d ever felt. I see my best friend. I see crashing waves and wind chime laughter. I see my past. I also see my future. I see those lazy Sundays. I see quiet evenings on the beach. I see the sunset against the ocean, and I see us floating through the cosmos. I see his skin on mine, those whispered promises in the dark of night. I see the place I’ve been searching for and never thought I’d find again.
halo. “You’re an angel,” I whisper. “An angel and her demon.” She sighs against my lips. “A heathen and his honeysuckle,” I respond.
Two lost souls find their way home.
“Look, man, I’m trying to have my post-workout snack right now, and you’re interrupting. Can you get to whatever the fuck your point is so I can get back to my meal?”
Everett just tossed me up into a bear hug and told me he was happy to have me home. He’s so much bigger than I remember. Huge, really. He must be at least a foot taller than I am at five foot four. Thick beard, corded muscles down his neck and arms, resembling some kind of tattooed motorcycle-gang—Hercules. He still has that wicked gleam in his eye that tells you he’s got a wild side. It almost reminds me of my sister.
“I got the idea to add a diamond to this ring the night you gave it to me all those years ago. I’ve always known it was gonna be you, honeysuckle.”
