All those moments throughout the days, weeks, months that don’t get marked on calendars with hand-drawn stars or little stickers. Those are the moments that make a life. Not grand gestures, but mundane details that, over time, accumulate until you have a home, instead of a house.

“I want to kiss you all the time, Daphne,” he says. “Sometimes it’s just easier to find an excuse.”

But you—you make love so easy, Daphne. You make me think I already deserve it, exactly how I am.

“But if I’ve learned anything from parenting, it’s that it matters way more that you’re present than that you’re perfect.

You’re wonderful. You’re the reason for the word wonderful. It really shouldn’t be used for anything else.

But also because I can admit what I couldn’t before: I like Miles Nowak enough that he could really hurt me.

This moment, though fleeting, belongs to me too.

“I like that it feels like I can live as many lives as I want,” I say.

a part of me had still ached. Could feel that I was standing outside of things, waiting for the moment I would finally become a part of it.