It Starts with Us (It Ends with Us, #2)

by Colleen Hoover

“Absolutely. I want it all. Flowers and bridesmaids and shit.” I pop a fry into my mouth. “And romantic vows, and an even more romantic honeymoon.” “Where would you go?” “Paris. Rome. London. I have no desire to sit on a hot beach somewhere. I want to see all the romantic places in Europe and make love in every city and take pictures kissing in front of the Eiffel Tower. I want to eat croissants and hold hands on trains.”

How do people leave these cycles when they don’t have the resources I had or the support from their friends and family? How do they possibly stay strong enough every second of the day? I feel like all it takes is one weak, insecure moment in the presence of your ex to convince yourself you made the wrong decision. Anyone who has ever left a manipulative, abusive spouse and somehow stayed that course deserves a medal. A statue. A freaking superhero movie.

“You’re going to drive five miles just to give me a hug?” “I’d run five miles just to give you a hug.”

Sometimes people think if they love a broken person enough, they can be what finally repairs them, but the problem with that is the other person just ends up broken, too.

“You can’t compare our situations, Mom. I had a lot of support that enabled me to make the choice I made. You had no one.”

I realize in this moment that the hardest part about ending an abusive relationship is that you aren’t necessarily putting an end to the bad moments. The bad moments still rear their ugly heads every now and then. When you end an abusive relationship, it’s the good moments you put an end to.

My loyalty is to the people who bring positivity into my life. My loyalty is to the people who want to build me up and see me happy. Those are the people I’m going to make decisions about my life for.

“I still feel like you do, though. Worried about boredom. Why are we expected to pick one thing to try and be successful at? What if I want to do something completely different every five years?”

There’s this toxic belief that family should stick together simply because they’re family. But the best thing I ever did for myself was walk away from them.

Maybe the idea of love ending being a negative thing is simply a matter of perspective. Because to me, the idea that a love came to an end means that, at some point, there was love that existed. And there was a time in my life, before you, when I was completely untouched by it.