I didn’t fall in love with James. Falling sounds like an accident. Falling hurts. I’d fallen in love with Michael, fallen hard like slipping off a cliff and hitting the rocks below. Falling in love was something I’d vowed never to do again. I chose to love James.

But the problem with looking back when you should be walking ahead is that you usually end up walking into something that hurts.

This is the truth. I have been in love. I have been in lust. I’ve made good choices and bad ones, I have been smart and I’ve been stupid. But I have never in my life felt the way I do now, here, with Will.

I've done my best to drive you away, Sadie," he said suddenly. "But you've never left me.

Sometimes grief is a comfort we grant ourselves because it's less terrifying than trying for joy. Nobody wants to admit it. We'd all declare we want to be happy, if we could. So why, then, is pain the one thing we most often hold on to? Why are slights and griefs the memories on which we choose to dwell? Is it because joy doesn't last but grief does?

But sometimes it's the sunshine that frightens us more than the big black shadows.

I was trying to replace something I'd come to care about very much with something pretending to be as important.