There are a million ways to lose someone you love.

Time would not change what I was feeling--or not feeling. I'd had time, and though the ache from his desertion hadn't disappeared, it was decreasing. My future was blurry, yes, but I was beginning to imagine a future when I would no longer miss him at all.

He laughed, and the sound reduced the pain of every sore place on my body to the dullest ache.

The last time someone dried my hair for me was in sixth grade, when i broke my arm." "How did you break it?" "I fell out of a tree." "You fell out of a tree?" "I think there was a boy and a dare involved." "Ah.

Look at me, Emma." Her eyes are full, the lids heavy. "Graham," she breathes. "I need you to hear me." Cradling her head in my hands, thumbs sweeping her tears away, I stare into her eyes. "I belong to you. There is no one else. All I want is to be where you are.

You 're so beautiful.

His breath in my ear, he ran his tongue along the curved edge, sucking the fleshy lobe and my small diamond stud into his mouth, and my eyes drifted closed while I babbled a weak sound of longing.