the truth about forever
by Sarah Dessen
Published May 2004 by Puffin then Speak
374 pages
Meet Macy. It is the summer between her junior and senior year. Her boyfriend, Jason, is headed to Brain Camp. She is going to cover for him at the library while he is gone. Double bummer, right? No, that isnt’ the half of it. You quickly get a look at how dysfunctional their relationship is. Macy has fit herself into his life. Jason is smart, orderly and focused. She likes Jason’s neat and orderly life, because it keeps her distracted from hers. She needed him to “fix” her after her father’s death. But he didn’t “fix” her, just super-imposed his life onto hers. This made her happy, until chaos entered her life.
INCOMING!!!! Wish Catering will provide a little spice and chaos to Macy’s summer. The characters of Wish are utterly delightful. They provide a needed 
contrast to Macy’s safe, structured path. Nothing ever goes as plan for Wish Catering, but they seem to survive every crisis. Each contact with them gives Macy some much needed therapy. Kristy tried to talk her through the “break” with Jason (see Music Monday). The slow building romance with Wes made it hard to put down the book. Their game of “truth” allowed them to safely get to know each other. It gave them a way to mourn and honor the 
parents they lost. They also found each other. Macy has a hard time finding her voice, her ability to stand up to her mom, and quit being invisible. I found myself wanting to shake her or yelling for Macy and Wes to kiss. Even though there is an incredibly “real” romance between these two, Delia’s words of wisdom are my favorite. Delia is full-blown pregnant, running a catering company on the brink of disaster at every event, has a small child and surrogate mother to four others. But she lays beautiful nuggets of wisdom out there for us to hold onto. I love the pot hole quote above. She gives some great advice about losing someone we love.
“Some people, they can just move on, you know, mourn and cry and be done with it. Or at least seem to be. But for me…I don’t know. I didn’t want to fix it, to forget. It wasn’t something that was broken. It’s just…something that happened. And like that hole, I’m just finding ways, every day, of working around it. Respecting and remembering and getting on at the same time. You know?”
I’ve never heard anyone put honoring the loss of someone so perfectly. I am at the age where too many friends and family have or are suffering with cancer or killed in an accident. We shouldn’t forget, replace or distract ourselves from remembering how much they meant to us.
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