He Chose Novels & Stories

You chose it," he said. Flat. "I chose it," I said. "I'm not going to tell you I didn't have a choice, because I did. I could have found another way to disappear that left room for you to know I was still somewhere. I didn't pick either of those. I picked the version that made me look completely gone, because I believed it was the version that was best." "You believed," he repeated. Not quite a question. Testing the word. He was quiet for a while. Above us, the noise had thinned to something more like movement than chaos — fewer raised voices, more footsteps, a rhythm that sounded almost organized, though I couldn't have said whose.

Easier. Temporary had always been his favorite word. I look back at Dante. At the way he’s already adjusted the world around me instead of asking me to endure it. “Did you choose this?” I ask. “Or did it just… happen?” He steps closer—not invading, not retreating. Grounding. “I chose it,” he says. The words settle somewhere deep in my chest, rearranging old damage. Ricky never chose me. He chose the idea of me—when it served him.

He must've been waiting for that moment for the past seven years. Didn't matter anymore. On the way home, I picked up some pork ribs.

“I have no fear or doubt in my decision. I don't want to sever our bond anymore. We might have figured our fate earlier than our mates but I don't regret it. I choose us, I choose you Karl.” The words don’t shake. They don’t rush. They land solid and true. Karl freezes. Actually freezes. For half a second, I worry I broke him. “Say that again,” he whispers. I smile, tears stinging my eyes. “I choose you. Not because I’m scared. Not because I need protection. Because I want you. Because when the world goes quiet, you’re who I look for.” His breath shudders out of him. He steps forward like he’s afraid I’ll disappear if he moves too fast. His hands hover at my waist, unsure.

His hand trembled as he picked up the pen. But just as the tip touched paper, he suddenly looked up. Tears fell down his face. "Carol… is it really over between us? If you can forgive me, I can change… I can send Luna to prison, I can—" "Jeff." I looked at him, my gaze as calm as still water. "Sign it. Save yourself a little dignity." His tears froze on his face. He understood my eyes in that moment. There was no love, no hatred—only endless indifference. The look one gives a stranger. Only then did he realize—he had truly lost me.

"I chose you. I want you to remember that regardless of what tomorrow looks like." I looked at him. "Say that again." "I chose you. If I don't come back tomorrow. Remember that I chose you."

So I was going to use his guilt and regret to make sure he never appeared in front of me again. I wiped away my tears and looked him straight in the eye. My voice was filled with cold mockery. "Why would you ever think I'd choose to be with the man who not only killed my mother but also my child?"

My daughter and my husband’s godson were diagnosed with acute leukemia at the same time. The doctors said a banked cord-blood unit could save a life. His foster sister, Rebecca Sloan, knelt in front of me with her son in her arms and begged until her voice gave out. “Claire, please, let Leo have the cord blood. His father died right after he was born and I never banked any of my own. Have some pity on the two of us. “Leo is the only child I have. I’m begging you. Save him.” I refused outright. I was not going to gamble with my daughter’s life. Then, on the morning of my daughter’s treatment, my husband, Ethan Hale hit me with his car and left me critically injured. The wheels went ove

On the day of the bridal shoot, Nathaniel White's childhood friend, Yvonne Woods, turned up out of nowhere with an armful of flowers and threw herself into his arms, laughing. The photographer couldn't look away and turned the camera toward them again. I stood off to the side in my wedding dress with no idea what to do. The shutter clicked 99 times. Not once was the camera pointed at me. Watching how comfortable they were with each other in front of the camera left a bitter ache in my chest. Nathaniel and Yvonne, the girl he'd grown up with, were both very good-looking. Whenever they stood side by side, every photographer aimed straight at them. The day he asked me out and I said yes, a frie

Albert Shearer, who was cold to intimacy, satisfies his physical needs while looking at photos of his female mentee, Ellie Jett. I immediately suspect that he's developed feelings for her. Later, Ellie's act of showing off in the operating room leaves my mother, Bernice Lourd, paralyzed. I give Albert two choices—send her to prison or divorce me. Albert spends the entire night on the balcony with the cold wind blowing against him. The next day, he submits evidence of Ellie's grievous medical misconduct. From then on, he becomes known throughout the medical community as a whipped husband, and our marriage returns to the way it was before. That is, until I discover I'm pregnant. Wanting t