It Ends with Us by Colleen Hoover (z-lib.org).epub

We become a sobbing mess of tears and broken hearts and shattered
dreams. We hold each other. We hold our daughter. And as hard as this
choice is, we break the pattern before the pattern breaks us.
He hands her back to me and wipes his eyes. He stands up, still crying.
Still trying to catch his breath. In the last fifteen minutes, he lost the love
of his life. In the last fifteen minutes, he became a father to a beautiful
little girl.
That’s what fifteen minutes can do to a person. It can destroy them.
It can save them.
He points toward the hallway, letting me know he needs to go gather
himself. He’s sadder than I’ve ever seen him as he walks toward the door.
But I know he’ll thank me for this one day. I know the day will come when
he’ll understand that I made the right choice by his daughter.
When the door closes behind him, I look down at her. I know I’m not
giving her the life I dreamed for her. A home where she lives with both
parents who can love her and raise her together. But I don’t want her to
live like I lived. I don’t want her to see her father at his worst. I don’t want
her to see him when he loses his temper with me to the point that she no
longer recognizes him as her father. Because no matter how many good
moments she might share with Ryle throughout her lifetime, I know from
experience that it would only be the worst ones that stuck with her.
Cycles exist because they are excruciating to break. It takes an
astronomical amount of pain and courage to disrupt a familiar pattern.
Sometimes it seems easier to just keep running in the same familiar circles,
rather than facing the fear of jumping and possibly not landing on your
feet.
My mother went through it.
I went through it.
I’ll be damned if I allow my daughter to go through it.
I kiss her on the forehead and make her a promise. “It stops here. With
me and you. It ends with us.”