The Truth about Heartbreak (The Truth About #1)

by B. Celeste

Home is relative. It’s a place of residence, no matter how temporary.

I’ve learned not to get my hopes up, because when things come crashing down I’m the one left suffering while everyone else walks away unscathed.

Trust isn’t something that comes naturally. It’s trial and error.

Someone told me a long time ago that trust is like an eraser; it gets smaller and smaller until there’s nothing left. I don’t want it to disappear, so I don’t use it much.

I’ve always loved love stories. Mostly because they give me hope. It’s why I sneak books and devour the romance, waiting for my time to be swept off my feet and into the arms of a knight in shining armor. It’s cheesy, really cheesy, but it’s what keeps me going when I just want to stop. Stop feeling, stop hoping, stop wishing.

They’re just words and words mean nothing. Actions on the other hand? Actions mean everything.

“We put on an act, but we can’t really fool everyone.” “Why not?” My voice cracks. He eyes me. “Because there’s always going to be somebody out there who knows us better than that.”

That’s what true love is—making sacrifices and changes for the other person.

But love isn’t so black and white, okay? It’s a complicated thing.” I lean back, frowning. “But it shouldn’t be. Love is … love.” My voice is weak, my belief nothing but shattered expectations that I know first-hand. Maybe he’s right. Everett and I aren’t black and white. We’re technicolor, too blinding to sort through.

It’s funny how the heart can still hurt over something it has expected all along. But I guess that’s not entirely true. The truth about heartbreak is that there is no such thing. It’s your soul that shatters, along with every fiber of your being that screams for another person.

But home isn’t as simple as four walls and a roof. Home isn’t a place. It’s a person.

Using people gets you nowhere but in a tangled mess of what-ifs and unrequited feelings.

Stop crossing oceans for people who won’t even jump over puddles for you.”

“Signs are what people bank on when there’s too much doubt in something they want to believe,”

“You can ask the universe for a sign or guidance, but it won’t do you a lick of good, kid. We see what we want to when we’re good and ready.”

“There are many kinds of loves out there, but it’s the real thing that’s hard to find, because it’s extremely rare,” he tells me in an uncharacteristically soft tone. “Sometimes you meet that one person in your life who holds all of that love for you and then some.” But how could that be Everett to me? “Could those people hurt you?” He taps the edge of the table. “They’re the only ones who have the power to hurt us. But it’s only us who has the power to forgive.”

Promises aren’t what make the foundations of good relationships, commitment is. We can promise people anything, stretch ourselves thin to maintain them, and then waste away from guilt when they can’t be achieved. You can’t promise people anything, son. You’re setting yourself up for disappointment, for failure. Sometimes it takes more than that to prove what you’re willing to do for a person.”

Sometimes, distance is a blessing in disguise. It makes us realize who we need in our lives and who we don’t.

Sometimes distance is hope in disguise.”