She squeezed my hand, and I drew a shaky breath, marveling at the fact that while on an ordinary leave in an ordinary place, I'd somehow fallen in love with an extraordinary girl named Savannaah Lynn Curtis.

Love hurts. There is nothing as painful as heartbreak. But in order to learn to love again you must learn to trust again.

She wanted something else, something different, something more. Passion and romance, perhaps, or maybe quiet conversations in candlelit rooms, or perhaps something as simple as not being second.

I breathe deeply, taking in the fresh spring air. Though Beaufort has changed and I have changed, the air itself has not. It’s still the air of my childhood, the air of my seventeenth year, and when I finally exhale, I’m fifty-seven once more. But this is okay. I smile slightly, looking towards the sky, knowing there’s one thing I haven’t told you: I now believe, by the way, that miracles can happen.

I have loved another with all my heart, and for me that has always been enough.

Remember: A best-selling book usually follows a simple rule, It's a wonderful story, wonderfully told; not, It's a wonderfully told story.

There's nothing you can tell me that will change how I feel about you. Nothing. Because that isn't you. It's never been you. You're the woman I've come to know. The woman I love.