Five Feet Apart

by Rachael Lippincott

If I’m going to die, I’d like to actually live first.

“That treatment crap is what stops us from being down there and actually living.”

And I realize I’m doing the one thing I’ve told myself this whole time I wouldn’t do. I’m wanting something I can never have.

“Cystic fibrosis will steal no more from me. From now on, I am the thief.”

I didn’t know it was possible for a person to make old things become new again.

“If this is all we get, then let’s take it. I want to be fearless and free,” she says, giving me a look, daring me. “It’s just life, Will. It’ll be over before we know it.”

“People in the movies are always saying, ‘You have to love someone enough to let them go.’ ”

“We need that touch from the one we love, almost as much as we need air to breathe. I never understood the importance of touch, his touch . . . until I couldn’t have it.”