I open my eyes wide now.
I sit up as much as I can.
And I listen.
Stay, he says.
Choices. Seventeen-year-old Mia is faced with some tough ones: Stay true to her first love—music—even if it means losing her boyfriend and leaving her family and friends behind?
Then one February morning Mia goes for a drive with her family, and in an instant, everything changes. Suddenly, all the choices are gone, except one. And it’s the only one that matters.
If I Stay is a heartachingly beautiful book about the power of love, the true meaning of family, and the choices we all make.
Well, what is this?
What am I coming to?
And beyond that, what am I gonna do?
Now there’s blankness
Where once your eyes held the light
But that was so long ago
That was last nightWell, what was that?
What’s that sound I hear?
It’s just my lifetime
It’s whistling past my ear
And when I look back
Everything seems smaller than life
The way it’s been for so long
Since last nightNow I’m leaving
Any moment I’ll be gone
I think you’ll notice
I think you’ll wonder what went wrong
I’m not choosing
But I’m running out of fight
And this was decided so long ago
It was last night
Life might take you down different roads. But you get to decide which one to take.
Due to severe head injury she got from the accident, Mia was in a Glasgow Coma and no one has any idea if she might wake up or just plainly give up. Although in this book, it was in Mia’s point of view. She’s in the in-between state and is in the process of deciding which way to go.
We are like Humpty Dumpty and all these king’s horses and all these king’s men cannot put us back together again.
Flashbacks are a major part of this book. It will have snippets of her moments with her loved ones, her dad, mom, Teddy, and Adam. And from each of this moments, comes the reflection on the lessons imparted by these important people in her life. But most of all, it will take back the readers in her most memorable moments with Adam. It will show us that there is no guaranteed happily-ever-after for every couple that risks entering into a relationship. There’s no insta-love because falling in love is a process. It tells us that to find peace and harmony in a relationship, there must be communication. It takes time for the relationship to grow and dig its roots into the hearts of the couple involve. It takes time for it to be tenured. There will always be problems along the way but if you truly value whatever you’ve built together, you’ll always be each other’s choice.
All relationships are tough. Just like with music, sometimes you have harmony and other times you have cacophony.
My favorite scene in this book happened in the last few chapters of this book. I think I knew that Mia was really planning to give up the fight. Her grandpa and Kim, her bestfriend freed her from being guilty over leaving them. But then, Adam was not really ready to give her up. His speech, was one of the most heartbreaking lines, I’ve read so far. It goes like this.
“Stay. There’s no word for what happened to you. There’s no good side of it. But there is something to live for. And I’m not talking about me. It’s just…I don’t know. Maybe, I’m talking shit. I know I’m in shock. I know I haven’t digested what happened to your parents, to Teddy….
“All I can think about is how fucked up it would be for your life to end here, now. I mean, I know that your life is fucked up no matter what now, forever. And I’m not dumb enough to think that I can undo that, that anyone can. But I can’t wrap my mind around the notion of you not getting old, having kids, going to Juillard, getting to play that cello in front of a huge audience, so that they can get the child the way I do every time I see you pick up your bow, every time I see you smile at me. ”
“If you stay, I’ll do whatever you want. I’ll quit the band, go with you to New York. But if you need me to go away, I’ll do that, too. I was talking to Liz and she said maybe coming back to your old life would just be too painful, that maybe it’d be easier for you to erase us. And that would suck, but I’d do it. I can lose you like that if I don’t lose you today. I’ll let you go. If you stay.”
And I know that deep inside, she was also not ready to give him up. What would be her decision? Will she stay? Or will she just give up? It’s up for to find out on the next installment, Where She Went.
Remembering Adam would be like losing him all over again, and I’m not sure if I can bear that on top of everything else.
If I Stay gives emphasis on the theme: sacrifice and choice. Is making a choice you do not want, considered a sacrifice? How far will you go to prove your love for a person? Are you willing to sacrifice on a choice just to let your partner become happy? Or are you willing to let him sacrifice something, even if it will change the personality of your partner, just for the sake of your happiness?
“Sometimes you make choices in life and sometimes choices make you.”
“I realize now that dying is easy. Living is hard.”
“And that’s just it, isn’t it? That’s how we manage to survive the loss. Because love, it never dies, it never goes away, it never fades, so long as you hang on to it.”
“Don’t be scared…Women can handle the worst kind of pain. You’ll find out one day.”
“But I’d understand if you chose love, Adam love, over music love. Either way you win. And either way you lose. What can I tell you? Love’s a bitch.”
“People believe what they want to believe.”
“You can have your wishes, your plans, but at the end of the day, it’s out of your control.”
“All relationships are tough. Just like with music, sometimes you have harmony and other times you have cacophony.“
“Life might take you down different roads. But you get to decide which one to take.”
Gayle Forman is an award-winning author and journalist whose articles have appeared in such publications as Jane, Seventeen, Glamour, Elle, and The New York Times Magazine, to name just a few. She lives in New York City with her husband and daughter.
