Love It was something I thrived on once. Something that I longed to have in my life every day, and when I found it at a young age, I clung to it. I snatched up the boy as fast as I could, intending to make him mine forever. Commitment I never expected my marriage to turn out the way it did. I never expected for my husband to let me go. For that love that I had invested in to come crumbling down around me. Something that once gave me such great joy. Him After the pieces of myself broke, I was surprised to find a man who was willing to pick them up, to catch me as I fell. What he wanted from me though, I didn’t know if I could give him. All he wanted was for me to let him in.

Two years. Who kisses someone and then doesn't say anything for two years? Greg Moran, that's who. That kiss might not have started it all, but it sure did change everything. I thought I was living a simple life, keeping to my friends, eating pickles with ice cream, drinking bourbon on the weekends, and taking naps after work. Looking back at it all now, it was anything but simple. What happens in Vegas was supposed to stay there. But clearly, this time it wasn't. I married Greg Moran. My best friend. My boss. The man who I had loved for five years. Two years of silence broke me though. It caused me to do something no sane woman in love would do. I asked for a divorce.

One simple question changed both our lives. Can I keep you? We were only nine then, and all that mattered to us was seeing each other again. But that all changed as we grew up. Years of pretending like we didn’t know each other. That nothing we felt when we were younger had ever happened. As if that question was never asked. Who knew that it would take so long for us to figure it all out? To stop pretending and finally realize that we had been there for each other all along.

It might have taken us 21 years, but it’s finally here. And this is our story.

The first time I shook her hand, I knew she was the one. But my breath stalled when I grazed the cool metal on her finger and when I looked down at that fucking ring, my heart stopped. Now, she’s back in town and after five years, I had no idea what’d happened. Instead of her husband standing by her side, holding her hand, there was a little girl. I wanted to know their story. Because when it came to Melanie, I needed to know every little thing.