Time goes too quickly. This is the advice that my mother should have given me from her hospital bed. Instead of vague, unknowable quips like "Be careful what you wish for," she should have told me time slides away on a hillside of loose shale and takes everything in its path - dreams, opportunities, hopes. And youth. It takes that fastest of all.

It was true; always had been. Friendships were like marriages in that way. Routines and patterns were poured early and hardened like cement.

Real friends. The kind that don't purposely hurt your feelings or stop liking you for no reason.

Fifteen minutes later, Betsy came thundering down the stairs. "I'm going to the mall with Sierra to see a movie." Michael leaned forward, switched off the television. "Can you please rephrase that in the form of a question?" "Sure. Can I have some money?

That was what a best friend did: hold up a mirror and show you your heart.

She had been ready to love this man from the moment she first saw him. In all these years, that had never changed. They'd hurt each other, let each other down, and yet, here they were after everything, together. She needed him now, needed him to remind her that she was live, that she wasn't alone, that she hadn't lost everything.

Marriages go through hard times. Sometimes you have to get in there and fight for your love. That's the only way for it to get better.