Jenna Evans Welch

You may be slow to warm up, but once you do, you light up the whole room.

I hang out with you because I like to. You’re . . . different.”
“Different?”
“You know, like we talked about last night. We’re alike, you know?”

Suddenly I couldn’t hear his excuses anymore, only the hard truths. I’d spent nine months lying to my friends. I’d strained ties with my family. I’d completely changed my life to be closer to him, and our relationship had never been to him what it was to me. I had the fleeting thought that I could talk him out of it—tell him that I’d figured out a way to stay in Florence even longer—but even in that brief moment of denial I knew it was useless. When someone walks out of a relationship, there’s nothing you can do to keep them there.