The Bodyguard

by Katherine Center

And the washboard stomach? You don’t get those for free. He probably spent hours and hours maintaining that thing. Hours that would’ve been far better spent, say, fighting poverty, or rescuing homeless pets, or, I don’t know, reading a book.

“Fine,” I said, summoning a rather Oscar-worthy fake nonchalance. “Stop begging. I’ll be your girlfriend.”

True, I grew up in Houston. You might guess I’d been to a ranch before. But, honestly, no. I’d been to the Eiffel Tower, the Acropolis, the Taj Mahal, and the Forbidden City in Beijing, but I’d never been to a Texas ranch. I guess I was always too busy escaping.

“I like that he thanks me all the time. For all kinds of things. Things I would never have expected anyone to thank me for.”

Wow. There was something so inspiring about being so underestimated.

Because love isn’t like fame. It’s not something other people bestow on you. It’s not something that comes from outside. Love is something you do. Love is something you generate. And loving other people really does turn out, in the end, to be a genuine way of loving yourself.