Lying in bed that night, Ryder couldn't help to think about what Skylar said.

Is that true?

Is your life like a book?

A book you can look through, and learn from.

A book you want to play a part in, preferably the lead role?

A book you can't wait to keep reading.

A book you don't want to finish, but eventually you will.

Only trouble was, Ryder didn't want the book he had been given.

He had tried to close that book his entire life...rewrite it, or stop writing it. Period.

But, Skylar was right. Your life is a book, and you can't escape it. It's in your soul...in your mind...in your heart.
You are carrying that book around from the day you enter onto this earth. Into this world...blessed or cursed, who decides?

By each step you take, you make another word...a sentence...a paragraph...a chapter.

Until the end, and by then, you have created an entire book. Your book from start to finish!

You choose which direction you want it to go in, at least to some extend. The theme of the book belongs to your parents, the layout is already decided, the moral of it all. You might be able to have some influence later on, but certainly not in the beginning.

And you won't be able to control how many chapters it will end up having, right?

Ryder wondered if his book would make an imprint on someone.

Certainly not on him. Nothing good had ever happened to him. His story was just sad! It started out being pretty decent, but due to the choices his parents made, his story took a wrong turn! There was nothing he could do, he just had to follow along, that's what kids do. They have voices, and opinions, but some adults disregard them!

Reading through his book so far, it was filled with...

Nightmares.

Beatings.

Tears.

Who would want to read about that?

Ryder certainly didn't want to.

He wanted to forget about the past. Forget about his life. No point in looking at his story, there was absolutely nothing he could learn from a past like that.

He couldn't change anything anyway.

His book had already started, and he could easily predict the next chapters, it was practically writing itself. Pretty much a no-brainer.

The only positive thing in his life right now was Skylar.

That made him laugh out loud into the empty room - resonating back - hitting him like an invisible boomerang. It was dark, the night had made it's entrance, he loved the night time. He loved the darkness, when everything is dark, it is easier to hide.

He sighed loudly.

A girl he had known for less than a week, was the only positive thing in his life right now.

What a slap in the face.

He had nothing.

Nobody.

Did he even want a second chance?

To start over...?

Maybe.

He thought about Dave, he had turned his life around. If he could do it, so could Ryder? He seemed happy, but Ryder just realized, he knew nothing about his private life. He only knew facts about Dave's past - he used to drink, he used to race, he did some jail time, and he had left a failed marriage behind, that was years ago. He didn't know anything about what Dave was doing after hours. After a day's work, did he go home to an empty appartment? Did he have any family close by? Friends?

Ryder had no idea.

Skylar seemed content somehow. She smiled all the time, and it didn't seem like she had that much to smile about? Being in the park, having an ice cream made her ecstatic. Feeling the warmth of the sun on her face, that made her happy. But that's nothing, right? Her book started out okay too, but now? Her story was sad too, but she kept smiling. He didn't get that.

She knew she was dying, but she still felt like smiling? She insisted on seeing the beauty of it all, whereas all he recognized was darkness, the dark side of life. She insisted on adopting a brighter outlook...Two people - both dying - but looking at it from entirely different persepectives. And now their paths had crossed.

Life really is f..... up sometimes?

But here they were.

Forced to meet by fate?

Two ways of looking at life!

One bleak, one bright.

Better make the most of it, that's what people say. You hear people say that all the time, optimistic people. Ryder wasn't an optimist. He just wanted it to be over! Saying it out loud like that, sounded sad - even to him!

Living just to die, he was living, but trying his best to die young, to get away from this place. He had nothing, nothing mattered to him anymore.

Nothing made him smile or feel happy. He just excisted, he wasn't even trying to survive anymore.

Suddenly he remembered a poem, he had to read in High School - and just now, he realized, that one stuck with him.

"If I can stop one heart from breaking". By Emily Dickinson:

If I can stop one heart from breaking,
I shall not live in vain;
If I can ease one life the aching,
Or cool one pain,
Or help one fainting robin
Unto his nest again,

I shall not live in vain.

If you can do one good thing?...You have to do ONE thing right. To matter. To feel like your life matters?

"Cool one pain"

"Stop one heart from breaking"

He could do that. He sort of already was, right?

Years from now, if someone asked him: "What good have you done? How did you matter?"

He could say: "I read to a sick girl named Skylar. I gave her something to smile about. I helped her".

He had to.

He was forced to do it.

He just hoped that counted for something.

He wanted to have an impact on her. Or better yet, maybe he wanted her to have an impact on him?

Maybe Skylar really was his second chance?