Sarah Dessen: There has to be a middle. Without it, nothing can ever t...

Lifestyle is an terrible, unpleasant put to not have a very finest buddy.

Sarah Dessen

lifestyle finest terrible

Sometimes love can be an ugly thing.

Sarah Dessen

time-love ugly-things sometimes

There was no short answer to this; like so much else, it was a long story. But what really makes any story real is knowing someone will hear it. And understand.

Sarah Dessen

knowing real long

This was how I was dealing with everyone and everything lately, taking the good when it came, and the bad the same way, knowing each would pass in its own time.

Sarah Dessen

knowing way

How ballsy it was to just assume you know, with one glance, the things another person could live without. As if it was the same for everyone, that simple.

Sarah Dessen

glances assuming simple

It's only advice. Ignore it if you want.

Sarah Dessen

ifs want advice

I had to wonder whether it was possible that this wasn’t already decided for me, and if maybe, just maybe, this was my one last chance to try and prove it. There was no way to know. There never is. But I reached out and took it anyway.

Sarah Dessen

lasts trying way

When someone starts to change, and it’s obvious, it's sort of natural to wonder why. Right?

Sarah Dessen

obvious natural wonder

It wasn’t so much that I was positive. I just wasn’t fully subscribing to such a negative way of thinking anymore.

Sarah Dessen

way-of-thinking negative thinking

I wasn’t ready to think about the other yet: that it wasn’t that I wasn’t right for Macon, but that maybe he wasn’t right for me. There was a difference. Even for someone who things didn’t come easy for, someone like me.

Sarah Dessen

differences easy thinking

I wasn't ready for this, but then I probably never would be, and this year, like so much else, wouldn't wait. I had no choice but to get out of my car, with everyone watching and begin in earnest, alone. So I did

Sarah Dessen

car choices years

I didn't want to talk about what happened, so it seemed safest not to talk at all.

Sarah Dessen

happened want

Nothing happens for ages, and then all the changes come at once.

Sarah Dessen

things-happen age happens

With love like that, you can't get pick about how it finds you or the details. All that matters is that it's there. Better late than never.

Sarah Dessen

better-late-than-never details matter

Welcome to adulthood," she said. "It sucks as much as high school.

Sarah Dessen

welcome said school

Looking at her, I thought again how beautiful she was - even in jeans and a T-shirt, no makeup, she was breathtaking. So much so that it was hard to believe she could ever have looked at herself and seen anything else.

Sarah Dessen

makeup beautiful believe

I knew that it wouldn’t last. It was just a moment, a perfect moment, as time stood still and fleetingly everything fell back into its proper place.

Sarah Dessen

lasts moments perfect

As I stepped out to face myself in the mirror, reaching a hand to smooth away the steam, I saw myself differently. It was as if I had grown again as I slept, but this time just to fit my own size. As if my soul had expanded, filling out the gaps of the height that had burdened me all these months. Like a balloon filling slowly with air, becoming all smooth and buoyant, I felt like I finally fit within myself, edge to edge, every crevice filled.

Sarah Dessen

mirrors air hands

I was tired of hanging on, taking the torn pieces to make something whole with them.

Sarah Dessen

hanging-on tired pieces

talk was cheap and useless. Action was what mattered. And me, I was moving. Now, again, always.

Sarah Dessen

useless action moving

There has to be a middle. Without it, nothing can ever truly be whole. Because it is not just the space between, but also what holds everything together.