The First to Fall
The first night he came over, I was already drunk. I smoked cigarettes on the roof, swaying in the summer heat, pointing at planes passing over us and telling him they were shooting stars. I could feel him watching me, and knew he was falling in love. What I didn’t know was that I was, too. I was drunk when he told me he loved me; I was drunk when I agreed to be his girlfriend; and I was drunk when he shattered my heart. He was first to fall and first to leave, and I haven’t drunk since. — Lauren Vogel
Clarity in Confusion
I watched my mother, a Colombian Catholic, swim in the ocean, our family gathered beneath an eclipse. When we reunited a year later, my mother wore a hijab and prayed to Allah. I struggled to accept losing a familiar version of her far more than she had struggled when I came out as gay. With time, I realized I knew how to love unconditionally, even in confusion, because she had led by example. “God is God,” she said. So is family. — Jamie Valentino
Replanting Peace
I finally decided to sell my house — its walls a silent bystander to my failing marriage. The house had been my parents’ before. Although many of the flowers my mother planted had died, her pale pink peonies still bloomed every spring. “Sarah’s peonies,” she used to call them. I’m divorced now and my new partner, Deepak, is loving, kind, everything I’ve always wanted but didn’t feel I deserved. When Deepak insisted on replanting my mother’s peonies, I felt as if I’d also been replanted in a new, nurturing life. — Sarah O’Brien
What I See Now
We planned to tell everyone that day why my wedding dress fit me a little too tightly, why I would not be partaking in celebratory shots with my husband. But the ultrasound was concerning. I used to cry when I looked at our wedding pictures, recalling the paralyzing fear I hid with makeup and smiles, and the grief two days later when the bleeding started. Now I see the beauty; when there was nothing we could do but hope, we made our vows to hold on to each other. — Kelsey Christoffel
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