We’d written our own vows.
I looked in my beautiful wife-to-be’s eyes and couldn’t believe how lucky I was. She took my breath away, every day, just like the first time I saw her.
The officiant said a few words about marriage, and loving and supporting each other. He read a poem about two very different people being the perfect match because they filled the parts the other one was missing. And then it was time for the vows.
I’d thought long and hard about what I wanted to say. And what I’d come up with felt exactly right.
I looked her in the eye. “Briana, I agree to be harmless to you.”
She smiled, because she knew that was all of it. It was the only promise she needed to hear.
It was her turn. She gave me a wry grin. “Jacob, I agree to be harmless to you.”
The smile ripped across my face, followed by the sting of tears. And then I really couldn’t feel everyone’s eyes on me at all. It was just the two of us, alone together, showing up. Because that’s what love does. It shows up. And I’d never stop doing it.
I kissed my bride.
Acknowledgments
Thank you to nephrologist Dr. Jared Fialkow for your expertise and ER nurse Terri Saenz Martinez and Kristyn Packard, LPN, for answering a million DMs about life in the ER. Thank you, Liesl Burnes, RN, for the random and frequent late-night messages asking weird hospital questions. Beta readers Kim Kao, Jeanette Theisen Jett, Kristin Curran, Terri Puffer Burrell, Amy Edwards Norman, Dawn Cooper, and sensitivity reader Leigh Kramer—I couldn’t do it without you. Thank you to Sue Lammert, a licensed clinical counselor specializing in trauma, Dr. Karen Flood, and Dr. Julie Patten, licensed psychologist, for helping me to depict the mental health aspects of this book with sensitivity and accuracy. As always, my disclaimer that any errors in this book are my own and are no fault of the people who advised me.
A big thank-you to the Forever team for all they do: my editor, Leah Hultenschmidt; publicist, Estelle Hallick; cover designer, Sarah Congdon; production editor, Stacey Reid; Michelle Figueroa, Tom Mis, and Nita Basu from the audio team; and the countless other people who worked so hard to get this book into your hands.
Thank you, Valentina García-Guzio, for help with the Spanish. Thank you to Stephanie Arndt for the title suggestion when we had to rename the book at the last minute, and a nod to Sara Reda for chatting with me via DMs for days about what narrators I should check out for the audiobook.
Stacey Graham, I can’t believe we’re five books in! OMG! Thank you for taking me here, I’m loving the ride!
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Reading Group Guide
Discussion Questions
At the beginning of the book, Briana feels so much despair about her life situation, how nothing has worked out like she planned. Have you had thoughts like that in your life? Were you able to turn things around or find a different kind of outlook?
Compare and contrast Briana’s bleak outlook with Benny’s. What role does hope play in combatting depression?
How did Jacob’s social anxiety shape his daily life? Did you recognize some of those qualities in yourself or in others you know? How might Jacob’s story change your perception of meeting someone who seems shy or aloof at first?
How did writing letters, instead of texting or emailing, influence Briana and Jacob’s relationship at the beginning? When was the last time you’ve written a letter and who did you send it to?
Jacob uses journaling and exercise as his forms of self-care when his anxiety flares. What kinds of self-care help relieve your stress?
At one point, Joy tells Jacob: If you’re with someone who doesn’t speak your language, you’ll spend a lifetime having to translate your soul. Do you think Amy was selfish for not understanding Jacob better, or were they just incompatible from the start? How much of a strong relationship comes down to innate compatibility and how much is empathy and understanding?
Briana destroyed Nick’s house after she caught him cheating and later felt embarrassed for being so petty. Have you ever done anything in the heat of the moment and regretted it after?
Jacob has such a colorful family full of distinctive personalities. Who was your favorite and why? Who did you relate to most? How are the Maddoxes similar or different from your family?
How has Briana’s view of men been shaped by her mother and her own life experiences? Could you understand why Briana was afraid to love Jacob?
Have you ever considered donating blood or an organ? Why or why not?
Author’s Note
When my editor asked me to write a little something about my reason for the themes in this book, at first I thought maybe I’d talk about my experience with anxiety, or my desire to write my first divorced heroine. But when I sat down to start, I realized that the story I wanted to tell was a lot more personal. So personal, in fact, that it’s only just now that I can even bring myself to talk about it.
Here’s me taking a big breath.
In 2020, in the midst of everything horrible that was going on in the world, I started to notice that I was losing my hair.
It wasn’t super obvious. It was so minor I thought maybe I was imagining it. It just seemed a tiny bit thinner than usual. Maybe it was the stress of the pandemic and the election year, or perhaps I was a little bit anemic. My periods were awful, so it could have been that. I felt totally fine. I started taking iron and told myself if it didn’t improve in a few months, I’d go see my doctor just in case.
When I finally did see my doctor, my entire world was turned upside down.
I had chronic kidney disease.
Within the span of one week, I was diagnosed with that and a lifelong, progressive autoimmune disease, the cause of my condition. And the prognosis wasn’t good. I was given a thirty-three percent chance of my kidney disease going into remission, a thirty-three percent chance of it staying the same, and a thirty-three percent chance of going into full renal failure within five years. I was forty years old.