melon collier

But lately that kind of intimacy felt impossible. She wasn't quite sure how it had happened, or when, but distance seemed to be spreading between them like spilled ink, staining everything.

“It won't be easy," she said. "You know Meredith likes everything in its place. She'll want you here."

The smile he gave her was so sad and sloppy it broke her heart.

"You... hate easy."

"I do," she said quietly, stung by the sudden thought that without him, no one would know her that well.

"What will we be without him?" Meredith whispered, clinging to her.

"Less," was all Nina could think of to say.

"My granddaughters," he said quietly. Meredith could see how affected they were by the sight of him. For the whole of their lives he'd been like one of the apple trees on this property. Sturdy and dependable.

Jillian was the first to lean down and kiss him. "Hey, Grandpa."

Maddy’s eyes were damp. She reached over for her sister’s

Maybe she'd thought time was more elastic, or love more forgiving.

Even though I hadn't seen Rose since 1603 the love was still there, exactly as strong, and now it was hurting. It was hurting more than any physical pain could try to.

And she died and I lived and a hole opened up, dark and bottomless, and I fell down and kept falling for centuries.

It made me lonely. And when I say lonely, I mean the kind of loneliness that howls through you like a desert wind. It wasn't just the loss of people I had known but also the loss of myself. The loss of who I had been when I had been with them.

How do I go on when the person I love most in the world is in love with someone else? Someone tell me the solution, he thought, so I don’t have to play this losing game all the way through.