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by Jennifer Hartmann

Father didn’t love me; Mom didn’t love me enough. I guess that was why I loved too much. I had a lot of loveless holes to fill.

“Life is living. If you’re not living exactly the way you want to live, then what’s the fucking point?”

“Relationships are overrated. Love is nothing but a building block for collapse. A stepping stone for tripping and stumbling into a black hole you can’t climb out of it.”

But being jaded doesn’t come with age; it comes with hardship. And hardship can blow through like a stormfront, destroying everything in a blink. Five years old, fifteen, fifty. Doesn’t matter. Once you’re caught in the funnel, you never stop spinning out.”

“Confidence is like a muscle,” I told him. “It needs consistent exercise. The more you practice, the stronger it becomes. It’s not about eliminating self-doubt entirely—it’s about pushing through it.”

When something breaks you, you pick up the pieces and put yourself back together. Maybe it’s with stitches and glue sticks, but it’s enough to keep going. Nobody needs to stay broken.”

“You can’t think about the what-ifs,” I told her, veering back to her original statement, our steps in perfect rhythm. “That’s the shit that will end up killing you. It’ll override everything you’ve learned, all your logic, training, and basic instincts. Fear is a disease. It’s paralyzing. The only antidote is believing in your resilience. Every challenge is a chance to prove your strength.”

when I’d survived, I had to figure out how to live through that fear and pain going forward. And that’s the key—living through it, not in it. You recognize it, you channel it, you don’t try to smother it. There is no weakness in fear. You just can’t let it dictate your next move.”

“Every moment with you fucking hurts.” His voice was pure grit, words cracking and breaking. “Every moment without you…hurts so much more.”

“Falling for you has been the easiest thing I’ve ever done,” I confessed through the anguish. “Everything else? Painful. Torturous. Difficult beyond belief. But loving you…” The anger died out, flatlining to a dead pulse. “Effortless.”