Forever, Interrupted

by Taylor Jenkins Reid

“You met a guy at the gym named Jim?” Technically, this wasn’t his fault.

any time a man spoke another language it was inherently sexy to me

I have always lived by the rule that your clothes can be a mess but if your face looks good, no one will notice.

I liked that he would buy a new shirt for me but he wasn’t going to eat delicately in front of me.

I could feel that he loved me in a raw and real way, when it’s not all rainbows and butterflies, when sometimes it’s fear.

“I was going to wake up early tomorrow and go into the bathroom and write ‘I love you’ on the mirror with a bar of soap.”

We walked awkwardly down the block, too close together to walk gracefully.

She’ll know she came from two people that loved each other fiercely. She’ll know not to settle for anything less than a love that changes her life.

I know when I wake up that today will be just like the day before, devoid of honest laughter and a genuine smile, but manageable.

I never knew how sexy a wedding ring was on a man until it was my ring, until I put it there.

I had felt what it was like to be wanted by someone you wanted just as badly.

of. I was afraid that because I hadn’t known Ben long, I hadn’t known him well.

I lay there feeling like the luckiest girl in the world that this weirdo next to me was mine; that he lived here; that he had the right to demand his stinky pillow stay in my bed. I smelled it once more as I fell asleep, and I couldn’t imagine ever getting used to it, but before long, that was exactly what I had done.

What you feel defines that. You loved him. He loved you. You believed in each other. That is what you lost. It doesn’t matter whether it’s labeled a husband or a boyfriend. You lost the person you love. You lost the future you thought you had.”

I lost love, but I also lost someone I was attached to.”

But attachment and love are two different things. My heart was broken and I didn’t remember how to do things without him. I didn’t remember who I was.

You have to find a way to keep him in your heart and in your memories but do something else with your life. Your life cannot be about my son.

“Drunk words are sober thoughts,”

you have a boy and you raise him right and you hope that you’ve raised the kind of son that knows how to love and does it well.

Especially as a mother, you hope that your son is sensitive and passionate; you hope that he knows how to treat women well.

Thank you for being such a wonderful son. For being the son that you were. I couldn’t have asked for anything more from you other than just more time. I want more time.

That is what true love is. True love is saying to someone “Forget about us. We will be okay,” when it might not even be true, when the last thing you want is to be forgotten.

If I ever feel one tenth as alive as I felt with you…” I wipe a tear from my eye and try to gain control of my wavering voice. “You made my life worth living. I promise you I am going to do something with it.”

supernovas. They shine brighter than anything else in the sky and then fade out really quickly. A supernova is a short burst of extraordinary energy.”

“I like to think that you and Ben were like that,” she says to me. “That you ended abruptly, but in that short time, you had more passion than some people have in a lifetime.”

You are everything I have ever wanted in another person. You are my best friend, my lover, my partner. And I promise that I will spend the rest of my life taking care of you, the way you deserve to be taken

care of. My whole life I was never looking for something bigger than myself, and then I met you and I want to dedicate every day of my life to you. You are it for me. You are why I am here. Without you, I am nothing. So thank you, Elsie, for being who you are, and for spending your life with me.”

“I just love you so much,” I said. “I never knew what it was like to love someone so much and to be loved so well,” I said. “For the rest of time, I will be by your side, Ben. I will dedicate my life to you.”

My life without Ben felt like it was nothing, but here I am, doing something with it.

No matter how strong you are, no matter how smart you are or tough you can be, the world will find a way to break you. And when it does, the only thing you can do is hold on.