“What I didn’t say before no longer mattered. We had the entire future before us to say everything else.”

“My biggest regret is what I didn’t say… (Jake)”

“We didn't say or write anything for a long time. Normally silence like that was uncomfortable and awkward. Like you needed to say something to fill the empty space in the air. But it didn't feel like that with Samantha. Maybe it was because I couldn't say anything and fill the quiet, but I thought it was more about two people just being with each other, enjoying the slowdown and the rare sunshine.”

“It would have been really easy to spiral down into drugs or alcohol that year, for both of us. But instead we were there, together. We’d taken all the bad things that had happened to us and turned them around into something good and bigger than the two of us.”

“I wanted to scream as I stood there, my toes hanging over the edge of the dock. I wanted to let a gut-wrenching howl rip from my disfigured throat toward those clouded skies. I wanted to say every swear word my mother had ever taught me not to say.I would have settled for a cut-off whimper, just as long as some kind of sound came from my lips.”

“Yet I knew this was one of those experiences for me that made you grow as a person. This was one of those times that made you put things in perspective and appreciate everything you had.”

“Just don't take forever," he said as he stood. "If I've got miles of pain before me I'd rather start walking them sooner than later.”