Remember Us This Way

by Sheridan Anne

“I told you that you were the greatest love of my life,” I tell her, the words so hard to say out loud, but I know I meant every fucking word, maybe I still do. “That I would make you the happiest girl in the world and protect you with my life.”

We’re two halves of the same whole, and no matter how much I try to pull us apart and burn that tether between us, we’ll always be forced back together. It’s inevitable.”

allowing me to adjust and get used to the alien feel of his delicious intrusion.

I glance down at Linc’s grave one more time, a soft smile spreads across my face. “I hope you’re waiting for me, kid,” I tell him when Noah is far enough away and unable to hear me.

“Tell me you didn’t walk here,” I say, my lips moving against her temple. I hear the smile in her tone. “I can barely walk across my living room. I’m not stupid enough to try and walk all the way here,” she tells me, gently lifting her head and meeting my gaze. “I stole Hazel’s hoverboard and rolled my ass here.”

There are so many things that time won’t allow me to give her, but there is one, sir,” I say, getting choked up. “With your blessing, I would like to marry your daughter.”

while I might be a nineteen-year-old widow, I’ll also be the man who got to marry the love of his life and give her a day that she’ll always cherish. Getting to give her this will forever be my greatest achievement. No championship trophy or NFL contract will even come close.”

“I know it is, and as much as it kills me to see you going through this, knowing that I’m going to have to say goodbye, you can celebrate that it’s almost the end because once you reach it, a whole new adventure will be waiting on the other side.

“You were never supposed to be one of the many stars. You’re the whole damn sun.”

With that, Zoey Ryan, the love of my life, my bestest friend, slips away, and that invisible tether that’s existed since the moment I first met her is severed, and everything in my world just . . . stops.