This Is How It Always Is

by Laurie Frankel

He wasn’t dreading it, but he wasn’t looking forward to it either. He felt entirely neutral toward the date, like a quick trip to the grocery store for milk.

He couldn’t look at her because every sense and every fraction of a moment and every atom of his body was being in love with her. It was weird.

“For the moment’s all there is, my darling.”

How did you teach your small human that it’s what’s inside that counts when the truth was everyone was pretty preoccupied with what you put on over the outside too?

happy is harder than it sounds.

“I just feel a little bit sad. Sad isn’t bleeding. Sad is okay.”

“You can tell anytime,” Penn said, “but once people know, they can never unknow.”

Claude did take a call from Carmelo, whose grandmotherly advice was, “Fuck the bastards,” and though those were in fact the most comforting words he received all week, they weren’t enough to convince him to leave his room.

He was crying again, which didn’t seem possible. At some point, shouldn’t your face run out of water?

you know what’s even better than happy endings?” “What?” “Happy middles.”