Content:
⋆✴︎˚｡⋆  ➺ small town ➺ he falls first and harder ➺ second chance ➺ mutual pining ➺ it’s always been you ➺ flashbacks ➺ emotional damage ➺ found family  ⋆✴︎˚｡⋆

˚₊· ͟͟͞͞➳❥ This is book 2 in the Red Bridge Series. Each book in this series features a different couple and can be read as a standalone, but for maximum enjoyment, follow the recommended reading order.

Red Bridge Series:

1. What Should’ve Said
2. When I Should’ve Stayed   

❝ Biggest lesson in this world is that you’re never ready. Now, a bad feeling, that’s different—you listen when you have those because that’s your intuition speaking. But not ready? That’s just the fear of the unknown talking. ❞

He may have let her slip away, but he never stopped loving her.

Josie: Before the Moment 

There are ghosts at every corner. In the stolen kisses while I waitressed at the diner, in the town festivals at the square, in the many jokes about Betty Bagley and her pie at the Fall Farmer’s Market, and in the countless nights watching Clay make drinks with that handsome smile of his while I sat on a stool at his bar.

It should all feel familiar and comforting, and yet, it just makes it hard to breathe.

Tonight will be a defining moment for the rest of my life. I have to end it now…before it ends me.

Clay: After the Moment 

When Josie and I said “I do,” I thought it’d be us against the world forever. But I wasn’t expecting the world to be so against us. I know I should’ve stayed that night. And I definitely should have gone back sooner.

Because I don’t know how to be here. I don’t know how to be anywhere. I don’t know how to be without Josie at all. 

She’s fun and fiery and strong-willed and stands up for the people she loves—even when it borders on reckless. She’s everything good about humanity—my perfect person.

She might say we’re done, but it’s not over. We’ll never be over.

𝒢𝑜𝑜𝒹𝓇𝑒𝒶𝒹𝓈 | 𝒜𝓂𝒶𝓏𝑜𝓃