If I Stay

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take it anymore. Until I cannot be like this one
second longer.

There is a blinding flash, a pain that rips through
me for one searing instant, a silent scream from my
broken body. For the first time, I can sense how
fully agonizing staying will be.

But then I feel Adam’s hand. Not sense it, but feel
it. I’m not sitting huddled in the chair anymore. I’m
lying on my back in the hospital bed, one again with
my body.

Adam is crying and somewhere inside of me I am
crying, too, because I’m feeling things at last. I’m
feeling not just the physical pain, but all that I have
lost, and it is profound and catastrophic and will
leave a crater in me that nothing will ever fill. But
I’m also feeling all that I have in my life, which in-
cludes what I have lost, as well as the great un-
known of what life might still bring me. And it’s all
too much. The feelings pile up, threatening to crack
my chest wide open. The only way to survive them is
to concentrate on Adam’s hand. Grasping mine.

And suddenly I just need to hold his hand more
than I’ve ever needed anything in this world. Not
just be held by it, but hold it back. I aim every re-
maining ounce of energy into my right hand. I’m

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weak, and this is so hard. It’s the hardest thing I will
ever have to do. I summon all the love I have ever
felt, I summon all the strength that Gran and
Gramps and Kim and the nurses and Willow have
given me. I summon all the breath that Mom, Dad,
and Teddy would fill me with if they could. I sum-
mon all my own strength, focus it like a laser beam
into the fingers and palm of my right hand. I picture
my hand stroking Teddy’s hair, grasping a bow
poised above my cello, interlaced with Adam’s.

And then I squeeze.

I slump back, spent, unsure of whether I just did
what I did. Of what it means. If it registered. If it
matters.

But then I feel Adam’s grip tighten, so that the
grasp of his hand feels like it is holding my entire
body. Like it could lift me up right out of this bed.
And then I hear the sharp intake of his breath fol-
lowed by the sound of his voice. It’s the first time
today I can truly hear him.

“Mia?” he asks.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Several people came together in a short amount of
time to make If I Stay possible. It starts with Gillian
Aldrich, who started crying (in a good way) when I
told her about my idea. This proved to be quite a
good motivator to get started.

Tamara Glenny, Eliza Griswold, Kim Sevcik, and
Sean Smith took time out of their hectic schedules
to read early drafts and offer much-needed encour-
agement. For their enduring generosity and friend-
ship, I love and thank them. Some people help you
keep your head straight; Marjorie Ingall helps me
keep my heart straight, and for that I love and thank
her. Thank you also to Jana and Moshe Banin.

Sarah Burnes is my agent in the truest sense of
the word, harnessing her formidable intelligence,
insight, passion, and warmth to shepherd the words
that I write to the people who should read them.
She and the superb Courtney Gatewood and
Stephanie Cabot have made miracles happen where
this book is concerned.

When I first met with the team at Penguin, I felt
like I was sitting down with family. My extraordin-
ary editor, Julie Strauss-Gabel, has lavished Mia

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and her family (not to mention me) with the careful
attention and love you’d hope to get from a relative.
She is “Julie-special.” Don Weisberg put both heart
and muscle into this book, and the editorial, sales,
marketing, publicity, and design people have all
gone above and beyond, and for that I want to indi-
vidually thank: Heather Alexander, Scottie
Bowditch, Leigh Butler, Mary-Margaret Callahan,
Lisa DeGroff, Erin Dempsey, Jackie Engel, Felicia
Frazier, Kristin Gilson, Annie Hurwitz, Ras Shahn
Johnson-Baker, Deborah Kaplan, Eileen Kreit, Kim-
berly Lauber, Rosanne Lauer, Stephanie Owens
Lurie, Barbara Marcus, Casey McIntrye, Steve
Meltzer, Shanta Newlin, Mary Raymond, Emily
Romero, Holly Ruck, Jana Singer, Laurence Tucci,
Allison Verost, Allan Winebarger, Courtney Wood,
Heather Wood, and Lisa Yoskowitz. And finally a
huge thank you to the field reps who worked so hard
on behalf of this book. (Phew).

Music is a huge part of this story, and I drew a lot
of inspiration from Yo-Yo Ma—whose own work in-
forms much of Mia’s story—and from Glen Hansard
and Marketa Irglova, whose song “Falling Slowly” I
probably listened to more than two hundred times
while working on the book.

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Thanks to my Oregon contingent: Greg and Diane
Rios, who have been our compatriots through all
this. John and Peg Christie, whose grace, dignity,
and generosity continue to move me. Jennifer Lar-
son, M.D., an old friend and, as luck would have it
an emergency room doctor, who enlightened me
about Glasgow Coma Scales, among other medical
details.

My parents—Lee and Ruth Forman—and my sib-
lings—Tamar Schamhart and Greg Forman—are my
cheerleaders and most steadfast fans, who ignore
my failings (professional ones, anyhow) and celeb-
rate my successes as if they were their own (which
they are). Thank you also to Karen Forman, Robert
Schamhart, and Detta Tucker.

I didn’t immediately recognize how much of this
book is about the way parents transform their lives
for their children. Willa Tucker teaches me this les-
son every day and is occasionally forgiving when I
am too absorbed playing make-believe in my head
to play make-believe with her.

Without my husband, Nick Tucker, none of this
would be. I owe him everything.

Finally, my deepest thanks go to R.D.T.J., who in-
spire me in so many ways and who show me every
single day that there is such a thing as immortality.

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