She says you're not truly human until you've had your heart broken and you've broken someone's heart.

Sometimes,well,all the time,I can't think of what to say because I'm so dumb and stuff,and then maybe I think of it like five days later.

I milked, of course, and did some work around the barn, and tried not to think about Brian, which was like trying not to breathe.

So what if Brian made me feel like fireworks were going off inside me. He could also make me feel like a big fat clod of heartsick dirt. It was like he could take any emotion I had and make it ten times stronger. Which is great when it's happiness but pretty darn awful if it's anything sad.

How could I pretend to be someone else when I was already failing at being the person I already was?

Oh. Listen, this is really hard for me . . . " "What is?" "You know. Being liked." I started to cry. I couldn't help it.

Every fairy tale, it seems, concludes with the bland phrase "happily ever after." Yet every couple I have ever known would agree that nothing about marriage is forever happy. There are moments of bliss, to be sure, and lengthy spans of satisfied companionship. Yet these come at no small effort, and the girl who reads such fiction dreaming her troubles will end ere she departs the altar is well advised to seek at once a rational women to set her straight.