Second Chance Summer

“A thousand moments that I had just taken for granted- mostly because I had assumed that there would be a thousand more.”

“And I’ve realized that the Beatles got it wrong. Love isn’t all we need—love is all there is.”

“Daddy," I whispered, feeling my own breath hitch in my throat. "I love you."Just when I was sure he was asleep, the one corner of his mouth lifted in a smile. "I knew that," he murmured. "Always knew that.”

“You said you didn’t want to waste your time on people who aren’t going to matter,” I said, and he nodded. “But how do you know they’re not going to matter? Unless you give it a shot?”

“The thing is that people only get hurt—really hurt—when they’re trying to play it safe. That’s when people get injured, when they pull back at the last second because they’re scared. They hurt themselves and other people.”

“Just because you'd left something behind didn't mean that it had gone anywhere.”

“Looking at it, I got, for the first time, why people would bring flowers to sick people, stuck inside the hospital with no way to get outside. It was like bringing them a little bit of the world that was going on without them.”

“But one thing that I was learning about what happened when you stuck around—it usually seemed that other people were willing to stick by you as well.”

“As I looked out at the water, I realized there was nowhere to go, nowhere left to run. And I just had to stay here, facing this terrible truth. I felt, as more tears fell, just how tired I was, a tiredness that had nothing to do with the hour. I was tired of running away from this, tired of not telling people, tired of not talking about it, tired of pretending things were okay when they had never, ever been less than okay.”

“Knowing that each breath was another moment he was still here and, simultaneously, that meant that he had just moved a little closer to being gone.”

“It will be scary. But I know you can do it. Know that I'll be with you, if there's any way that I can manage it. And know that I have always -and will, for always- love you.”

“What was the point of trying to run away if people were going to insist on reminding you of what you were running from?”

“I kept thinking back to all those nights in Connecticut, when I was out the door as soon as dinner was over, yelling my plans behind me as I headed to my car, ready for my real night to begin—my time with my family just something to get through as quickly as possible. And now that I knew that the time we had together was limited, I was holding on to it, trying to stretch it out, all the while wishing I’d appreciated what I’d had earlier.”

“Love isn't all we need--love is all there is.”

“In all the medical dramas I’d ever seen, there was always some solution, some last-minute, miraculously undiscovered remedy. Nobody ever just gave up on a patient. But it seemed like in real life, they did.”

“You can always find your way out, no matter how lost you are.”

“I tried to shut out the feelings that were hurting my heart with a thousand tiny pinpricks, which was somehow worse that having it broken all at once.”

“(And believe me, you don't want me to be unhappy. I may be looking into the haunting thing right now.)”

“maybe Lucy was wrong - maybe sometimes there was such a thing as perfect moment.”

“Did you ever have a night that just...seemed to change everything? And everything is different afterward?”

“I leaned closer to look at it, at all those empty squares that represented the days of summer ahead.”

“It seemed crazy that something so big, so seemingly permanent, could be knocked down by a little wind and rain.”

“After dinner, out of nowhere, it started to rain. It caught me off guard, and seeing the world that had only been sunny and warm transformed by a sudden thunderstorm was jarring, a reminder of just how quickly things could change.”

“I tried to think of puns that might make my father laugh one more time, and I looked at the stars.”

“She seemed to still be completely unaware that Elliot was pining openly for her and messing up customers' orders as a result. And the one time I'd tried to hint to her that there might be dating prospects with someone she already knew, someone she was friends with, she'd thought I was trying to set her up with Warren, and things had briefly gotten very uncomfortable.”

“But how do you know they're not going to matter? Unless you give it a shot?”

“Sometimes my grandfather was awake, and would sit with me while I looked up at the stars, needing to see something fixed and permanent while everything else in my life was falling apart.”

“You can always find your way out again, no matter how lost you think you are.”

“But you have a heart that is big and beautiful and strong, and deserves to be shared with someone worthy. You get some perspective when you know you’re not going to get to flip a new month on the calendar. And I’ve realized that the Beatles got it wrong. Love isn’t all we need—love is all there is.”

“But as long as you know your constellations, you're never lost.”