The date of Briana’s divorce finalization is approaching and her brother is struggling on dialysis while he waits for a new kidney. Jacob’s ex-girlfriend began dating his brother only three months after their breakup, and he’s had to move to a new job to avoid them both. At first the transition is a disaster. He’s wildly unpopular in the new role, and his anxiety skyrockets. Briana despises him, thinking he’s trying to usurp her upcoming promotion, and when the two collide (literally), the situation grows even worse. So Jacob does the only thing he can think of, and writes her a letter.

This is a really cute little love story. It’s not really enemies-to-lovers, because all of the mishaps and misunderstandings in the early part of the book are pretty quickly explained away in the brief letter-driven portion of Briana and Jacob’s emerging friendship. Instead, this is a relationship that has other obstacles. A little white lie that turns into a fake relationship, a fake relationship that is more real to them both than either are willing to admit. Jacob’s anxiety disorder is a huge barrier, and Briana’s trauma over both her dad and her ex-husband abandoning her causes her to avoid romantic attachments regardless of feelings. Add in some other mishaps and miscommunications along the way, and you get a really sweet development of love over time, love that is never easy but is also very relentless.

I think my favorite thing about this book was the incredibly realistic depiction of an anxiety disorder. As someone who has an anxiety disorder, I could relate to so many of the things Jacob went through. His agonizing debate over the appropriate thing to bring for a lunch with a colleague. His need to research a restaurant menu and decide his options prior to any dinner out. His fear of new locations and the parking situations that they bring up. This last one in particular – I wrote down a quote that went with it because it was perfect and I wish all my friends and family would do this exact thing for me! I can’t tell you how many times I’ve avoided going to places because I didn’t know what the parking situation would be like!

“I have to go take a picture of the driveway,” [Briana] mumbled, getting up.
“The driveway?” [Alexis] asked.
“He needs to know where to park. It’s a thing.”

That. That right there is god-tier love. The fact that she did it for Jacob without him even asking her to? Thoughtfulness to the extreme. It was little moments like this that made me fall in love with this book.

As romances go, this was a very light-on-the-spice kind of book, more love story than romance in the traditional published sense. It was also (obviously) a little deeper on the thematic elements, giving it a roundness that I appreciated while still reading like a perfect comfort book.