Total pages in book: 122
Estimated words: 114951 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 575(@200wpm)___ 460(@250wpm)___ 383(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 114951 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 575(@200wpm)___ 460(@250wpm)___ 383(@300wpm)
Just like the case studies of children we’d covered in my sociology classes, I was resilient.
I stayed in school, worked nights and weekends to finish my undergrad degree and then earn my master’s. I poured every ounce of myself into becoming someone I could be proud of. I built a life for Georgie and me from the ground up. It was modest, but it was ours.
There were nights I fell asleep on the couch with his homework spread across my lap, the smell of burnt coffee in the air, student loan statements stacked on the counter. I was tired, but I was steady. I didn’t need saving. I told myself that over and over — that I could do this, that love wasn’t a requirement for survival.
But still, I’d catch myself lingering on other people’s lives. I stared too long at couples holding hands in grocery store aisles. The sound of laughter from a neighbor’s backyard would have my chest aching. The announcements from my college friends of engagements or babies made my eyes water. I told myself I didn’t crave it — but God, I did. I longed for security, for comfort, for the soft kind of joy that comes from knowing someone else was there with you to go through anything.
And then, Nathan Black walked into my life.
He was everything I thought I wanted — calm, certain, dependable. He came to one of our nonprofit fundraisers for the youth outreach program I was leading at the time. Older than me by a decade, Nathan was there to speak on behalf of the financial organization he worked for, to talk about the importance of budgeting and how to get started even as a kid. I remember thinking how effortlessly he commanded a room, how safe he made everyone feel, including me.
He asked questions no one else bothered with, listened like he actually cared about the answers. He told me I was extraordinary — that I’d done what most people couldn’t.
He asked if he could take me to dinner that night, and we ended up in a run-down diner at just past midnight, laughing as we bonded over our love for books and kids. And it happened so easily, how we went from strangers to dating. Nathan loved to dote on me, to take the weight off my shoulders in any way he could. He hired a housekeeper once a week to clean the apartment I shared with Georgie. He would often show up at my door with bags full of groceries. He’d cook for us and help Georgie with school projects.
For the first time in years, even though it was terrifying… I let someone take care of me.
The first few years of our relationship flew by, and they were as golden as a sun beam. Nathan would spoil me with dinners at restaurants that boasted dishes more expensive than my car payment. We’d take weekend trips to the lake with Georgie, where Nathan would grill and tell stories that had us all in stitches. He came to every event I organized, donated quietly to my programs, bragged about me in every room.
I felt seen and protected and cherished.
When he proposed, it was the easiest yes I’d ever said in my life — even if my mind did flash back to Shane. I knew it was silly, even then, to think about that boy. We had been kids when we fell in love. It had been so long since we’d even seen each other. I told myself it was just my heart holding onto the feeling of youth and innocence.
Nathan was my new path, and I was ready to walk it.
I thought I’d finally been rewarded for all the ways I’d fought and scraped and survived.
But slowly, the shine dulled.
It started with small things — the way he’d correct me when I told a story, as if I couldn’t quite remember it right. The way he’d suggest I wear my hair differently for a fundraiser, or tell me a certain dress wasn’t “professional.” At first, I thought it was love — a man who wanted me to be my best.
Then came the comments about my friends, the subtle sighs when I made plans without him. He’d tell me I didn’t need to work so much, that it was time to “enjoy the life he’d given me.”
And when I bristled, when I reminded him that I earned my life — that I had before him and could again — his smile would falter, and I’d see the flash of something behind his eyes I didn’t recognize.
By the time I did, it was too late.
Slowly, I found myself living a life I didn’t recognize. I didn’t work anymore — only volunteered for the organizations that were best suited for Nathan and his own professional goals. Nathan paid for everything — our house, our cars, our groceries, Georgie’s medical school tuition.