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Her relationship with Blake had proved fairy-tale love existed in real life, but it also proved that every fairy tale had a dark side, that happily-ever-afters sometimes came with less-than-happy epilogues, and that the One Big Love could crush your heart as easily as they stole it.
No, he hadn’t dumped her. He’d reached into her chest and dug out her heart, layer by layer, piece by piece, discarding and stomping all over them until Farrah had been sure she would die. She’d been raw, exposed, and bleeding, and he hadn’t even cared.
“I’ve only been in love with one person my entire life. She’s the one I dream of every damn night, and she’s the one who can break me with one tiny glance. I would jump off a fucking tower for that girl, and you know what? Her name sure as hell isn’t Cleo.”
The truth was, everyone was broken. People weren’t shells, hard and glossy like the statues you found in museums. They were messy mosaics, compromised of glittering pieces of love and jagged shards of heartbreak. The lucky ones found someone whose broken edges fit perfectly with theirs, like pieces in a jigsaw puzzle.
“I want you. All of you. Heart, body, mind, and soul. I want what we had.” His voice thickened. “I messed things up between us in Shanghai, and I’m so fucking sorry. I was young and stupid, and if I could do it all over, I would. But I can’t. All I can do is stand in front of you and ask for another chance. I know I broke your heart, but if you let me, I’ll spend the rest of my life putting it back together.”
“Don’t you know?” Blake’s voice cracked with regret. “It broke my heart too. Because everything I said that night was a lie. I didn’t stop loving you. I never stopped loving you.”
“Grudges are the worst thing to hold on to. No matter how bad someone hurt you, you can’t heal until you forgive. Sometimes that means moving on. Other times that means giving things another shot.”
Your first love is like a tidal wave. Your head can break above the water, and you might even make it to shore, but the slightest nudge and you’re in the deep again.
“It’s still yours, you know. It will never belong to anyone else. Not in this life, and not in the next thousand lives. You have my heart until the earth stops spinning and the stars turn to dust. You can love it or hate it or forget all about it. But it will always be yours.”
The most painful part of loving someone was knowing you couldn’t live without them but not being able to live with them, either.
