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“I think fairy tales might be more like cautionary tales than anything else. And fate is just an excuse for people to be inactive participants in their own lives.”
I don’t believe in fate. I can’t. I refuse to believe that first Mom and then Dad dying was part of some grand scheme. If that’s true, whatever’s at the end of my rainbow isn’t worth what it will have cost me.
When someone calls me brave for going out or wearing a fitted dress or for some other normal thing that every other girl does, what it really means is: I would be mortified to look like you, but good for you for merely existing even if all I can think about is how fat you are and how I’m terrified I’ll one day look like you. So brave.
Don’t you see how belittling this is! I’m not brave for wearing a dress. I’m just living!
After a few minutes, Anna hurries back, out of breath and a little sweaty. “Sorry, they made me go all the way out to the porta-potties. It took forever and it smelled gross.”
She is totally hooking up with Zeke.
I grin down at her as I take out my mouthpiece. “Just playing by the rules. Moo, bitch. Moo.”
And maybe—just maybe—fate isn’t a total crock. Maybe the fairy tales aren’t all wrong.
“He’s dead to me,” Drew says, like a switch has flipped in her brain. “Scorched earth. Dead to me.” Anna nods. “His pulse is nonexistent. The doctor is pronouncing the time of death as now o’clock. They’re calling the morgue. He’s dead.”
And there it is. I fell in love. I’m in love with Henry Mackenzie. I always assumed I would have a difficult time knowing if I was in love. What if I didn’t recognize the signs? Or what if it wasn’t as intoxicating as the whole world has built it up to be? But, for me, it feels very simple. It’s the kind of thing I know with just as much assurance as my birthday. It’s not something I feel lost in or confused by. It’s a truth, and some truths hurt more than others.
Choose what makes you happy. Things, places, people. Only choose the ones that bring that delight to you. Don’t be a hostage to duty or obligation. I didn’t carry you and birth you and raise you to waste your precious life on anything except unbridled joy. Choose joy.
The best part about crossing any bridge is the chance to look back and be able to fully understand where you came from. You’re not a machine. You’re not a computer. You’re an artist, and any good artist knows life feeds into art and art feeds into life.”
Ugh, I hate this word too!
