The Happy Ever After Playlist (The Friend Zone, #2)

by Abby Jimenez

This was just a season, and there’s beauty in all seasons. Even if you are looking forward to the next one.

Jason was slowly edging out all the things that froze me in time. He was thawing me from my nuclear winter from the outside in—and he was almost to my core.

She made me feel proud to know her, like having a woman like her care about me was its own sort of achievement.

I wondered offhandedly if this was what Dad had felt like when he met Mom…

I’m in an in-between, and if I keep making decisions that bury me there, I’ll never get out of it.”

Fourteen months of being separated was nothing compared to nothing at all.

I’d promised myself I would chase joy, climb out of my in-between, live a life of happiness that was worth living—and the only life I wanted to live was with him.

His eyes moved back and forth between mine. “I want everything with you.”

My world was a bleeding watercolor in the rain.

“My hands, my voice. My back to do your heavy lifting, my arms to carry you to bed when you’ve had too much tequila. My money, my time, my heart. It’s all yours, Sloan.”

“Tucker knew it. He took one look and he saw the other half of me inside of you and he brought you home.”

My “happiness” wasn’t always the real thing. Most of the time it was a fabricated, forced version that cracked around the edges if examined closely enough.

But it was the choice that was the accomplishment. I’d finally found the me I’d lost before. I was strong—heartbroken, but stronger than I’d ever given myself credit for.

How can you be at peace when you don’t know what you did to deserve it or what you could have done to make things different?

never know about it, but it would always be there. When she married someone else, had children, when she grew old, I would still be out there in the world, cherishing her in secret.

But my job is to help you with your crazy. Make you the best, most magnificent crazy you can be.”

“You think you know what love looks like. You think the fairy tales and the romantic movies prepare you. And then you finally, really truly find it and you realize you never knew a thing about it

“She was every love song I’ve never been good enough to write.”