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For all the women who had to raise themselves. Who hold the world on their shoulders and their hearts in their hands. This love story is yours.
Heat in south Alabama is a living thing.
No amount of infatuation justifies needing to be literally attached at the hip, taking up all the space in the hallway.
Doesn’t he know I’ve only ever had myself to depend on? Even when I thought I could count on him, he proved me wrong.
“You have no idea what I’m capable of handling.”
It’s like running on a treadmill. You do all this work just to end up right where you started.
I don’t know what it is about sitting in the cab of a car with another person that makes confessing your fears seem so much less daunting,
“You’re magic,”
One day, I vow, I’ll touch that same place, and it will be everything. With my fingertips, my lips. One day I’ll be able to hold her and replace all that fear with something sweeter. Something right.
It’s easier to think of Dad’s condition as a change in circumstances than the beginning of an ending. A semicolon rather than a period.
“I’ve never been kissed.” Her voice cracks and she swallows. Licks her lips again. “And I was wondering if you could change that.”
Does he know what a body feels like when the life goes out of it? How that person takes a piece of you with them, rips out a section of your soul and drags it from your flesh when they go.
It’s a season of wanting everything I can’t have, and despising everything that I do.
“Enjoy the moments of clarity as best you can. They come less and less as we move into the later stages.”
What a strange disease, that he can remember all of that and not the hours we just spent together watching it on this couch. Another piece of sand slips through the hourglass. I press play.
I throw the truck into reverse
and back out of the space, leaving my friend with a puzzled look on his face and my stomach in such intricate knots I could probably get a badge from the Boy Scouts for weaving them.
She glances over her shoulder, and I hold her gaze for only a second. It’s the last thing I take for myself.
The way everyone knows about the big and small moments in each other’s lives. Much as it’s miserable when that moment is a shitty one, it’s pretty spectacular when it’s something you’re proud of.
“You’ve got to allow people to grow, Delilah. You can’t spend your whole life seeing people as their worst mistake. I doubt you’d want to be judged by yours.”
I’ve never been able to decide if it’s the things I have done with Truett or those I wish I had, that make him one of my greatest mistakes. Only that he sits at the top of the list.
He accepts the help better from me when it’s not obvious that’s what it is.
The distance from her has made it clear this ebb and flow of love is a tool of hers, one she wields when she senses me pulling away. I’m so exhausted by it that I can’t be bothered to play along.
“I’ve never understood why you can’t see just how remarkable you are, you know that? You were way out of everyone’s league here. No wonder you moved away.”
“You wanna continue this conversation inside? I am sweating to death while you take your sweet time chewing on that revelation.”
“It’s hard to hear you talk down on this town when I know you love it.” He licks his lips, his gaze dropping to the glass in his hand. “It’s hard to hear you talk about leaving when what I really want is for you to stay.”
was different for me, Delilah. And I forget sometimes that the best thing that ever happened to me was the worst thing that happened to you.”
“You were my bright spot. I didn’t like to bring the clouds out when you were around.”
“Oh come on, Temptress. Surely you remember what I look like when I’m about to kiss you?”
“Turns out, no matter how long you think about problems, they still exist when you’re done.”
I’ve held captive for this particular Parker for my whole life. The ones
that never really left. Perhaps a weakness for them is genetic. A trait I inherited from my father.
“You can’t say things like that to me, Tru.” “And why not?”
“Because I might believe them.”
“I want you to believe them. I want to embed myself in your heart, become as vital to you as breathing. I’m tired of pretending like I haven’t thought about you every day since you left. To pretend I haven’t imagined you exactly like this.”
“Whatever you decide to do, I support you. If you need me to stay with Henry, just say the word. You need a ride to the airport, I’m your guy.” His firm gaze returns to mine. “You need me to tell her to fuck off, I’m also your guy.”
Our daughter is sensitive, and she doesn’t like conflict. She makes herself smaller to leave room for everything—and everyone—who dares to be bigger than her. I worry one day this world will swallow her whole.
You are mad. And you have every right to be. You don’t get any awards for having superhuman patience. Let it out. Be mad. I’ve got you.”
“Let it out. Scream some more. But don’t keep forcing it out of sight, thinking you can avoid it.”
“I’m mad that she has fucking season passes for guilt-tripping me into doing what she wants, like it’s somehow my fault
I’m mad that I don’t know which version of you is real. The one who walks away or the one who stays.”
“You can push me away. You can lash out. You can feel whatever you need to feel.” He tips my chin up, brushes his lips featherlight against mine. “But I’m never going to walk away. I’m never going to stop taking care of you. I will prove to you every day that I am this man. That I will not abandon you again.”
A breath apart, but also a lifetime.
“You know, I had my hopes that I’d eventually get to see you moaning in my clothes, but didn’t think it’d happen this quickly. Keep it up and I won’t make it through dinner.”
picture the boy who kissed me in a meadow, then broke my heart, neither of us realizing he’d one day be the man who mended it, too.
“Delilah, the amount of times I’ve thought of you naked in my bed is downright sinful. And yet I’ve never been able to feel the least bit ashamed of it.”
“I hate that you think so little of my favorite person in the whole world. You’re a remarkable little thing, Delilah, and you can’t even see it.”
But there’s a spark in her eyes that never existed in mine, something I’m not even sure she knows she has yet. I’m grateful for its presence. For the hope it gives me that she’ll be a fighter in this life rather than a mere observer.
Is this really love? I wonder. Worrying the person you’re with resents all your passions, solely because they’re yours?
It’s the weirdest part about having a kid. The part that took me the longest to get used to. When they hurt, you feel like you’re bleeding out. When they’re happy, you’re on top of the world.
