The Mostly True Story of Tanner and Louise

by Colleen Oakley

If there was anything worse in life than a man telling you to calm down when you were upset, she didn’t know what it was.

She’d learned long ago not to fight it, to make space for it, the way one might for a new tchotchke on the shelf, a souvenir from a trip you didn’t want to forget. That was all grief was, really, Louise had determined—remembering.

“Nothing in life goes according to plan. Nothing. And the sooner you accept that, the better off you’ll be.”

“Watch Oprah if you want inspiring. I just tell the truth.”

People always said life was short, but it wasn’t. Not really. You could cram so many different lives into one. Be so many different people. Louise would know. She’d been at least three.

“Sometimes it just feels like we still spend so much time trying to teach the house not to catch on fire, instead of teaching the arsonist not to light it.”

In life, there were two kinds of friends: friends who would wish you well on your journey to battle, and friends who would jump in the trenches with you.