Brooke was always my summer. She’ll always be my summer. And I had already made my choice a long time ago. Loving Brooke was what I was made to do.

Maybe everything really does just have an expiration date—one that you can’t see until she tells you she’s leaving, and then she’s gone.

The past isn’t always as beautiful as we paint it in our minds.

A part of me will probably always be waitin’ for her. And even when I get to the end of this life and she’s not there, I think I’ll still just wait. It’s the cruel reality of love, I think—that once you find it, it’s yours to carry. And even if you lose it and never find it back again, I think you still just keep on carrying it...and waitin’—long after the curtain closes.

But kind of like when you move something on a wall after it’s been there for a long time, and its place is bright but everything around it is faded—that’s how I feel about her. She wasn’t there very long, but when she left, everything around her memory sort of dimmed.

We’re all livin’ in the past...we’re really always eighty milliseconds behind life happenin’. ...that’s how long it takes our brains to comprehend what’s already taken place right in front of our eyes. So, I guess I’m not alone. Everyone’s livin’ in the past, to some extent. I’ve just become a prisoner of mine. ... I’ve become a prisoner—willingly. But then I guess you really can’t be called a prisoner if you willingly carry the chains.

Just remember, the single most important thing in this world is love. You find it, you fight for it.

I have to know if you believe in second chances—because I do, even if they do come with good-byes.