It was one thing to sacrifice your own life for someone else's. It was another thing entirely to bring into the mix a third party - a third party who knew you, who trusted you implicitly.

It still hurts," she whispered. "Even when you're doing it for someone else, that doesn't stop your ribs from getting cracked, or your wrist swelling, or your cuts from bleeding.

I love you," he whispered, and that was the moment he knew what he was going to do. When you loved someone, you put their needs before your own. No matter how inconceivable those needs were; no matter how fucked up; no matter how much it made you feel like you were ripping yourself into pieces.

To be fair, I am not the same man. The one who listened. The one who believed her.

Doing the right thing for someone else occasionally means doing something that feels wrong to you.

Love meant jumping off a cliff and trusting that a certain person would be there to catch you at the bottom.