54 pages • 1-hour read
Life's Too Short
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Themes
Living in the Present
Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of illness, death, and substance use.
Vanessa has spent the last few years traveling the world and chasing experiences, embodying a carpe diem philosophy from the outset. Her decision to live spontaneously stems from a personal understanding of mortality as she faces a 50% chance of developing ALS, which took her sister’s life before she turned 30. For Vanessa, living in the present isn’t just a motto but a matter of survival, allowing her to find joy and build a meaningful life even as fear lingers at the edges. She explains, “You should always have an adventure lined up. Having something to look forward to is tantamount to happiness” (52). Vanessa refuses to live her life waiting for tragedy to strike. Instead, she embraces every moment, treating time as a gift rather than a guarantee. Humor and honesty play an essential role as Vanessa’s laughter and openness are acts of defiance against fear. Even her YouTube travel videos are symbolic, capturing snapshots of life that might otherwise be lost. Through Vanessa’s character, Jimenez doesn’t shy away from the fear that accompanies mortality, but she celebrates the courage it takes to keep living anyway. Vanessa’s joyful approach to life demonstrates her commitment to living beautifully and bravely today because tomorrow isn’t guaranteed.
Once Vanessa meets Adrian, her outlook challenges him to rethink his relationship with time and control. Adrian is focused on stability and control. His need to plan, protect, and “do the right thing” is born from his desire to succeed and avoid disappointment. Yet, as he falls for Vanessa, he is forced to rethink his relationship with time. She exposes his “one day” approach to life: “You live your life like there’ll always be one day to do all the things you put off. One day you’ll take the trip. One day you’ll have the family. One day you’ll try the thing” (108). Loving Vanessa means understanding that there are no guarantees of a tomorrow, and that life doesn’t wait for the perfect moment. She challenges Adrian to savor the small moments because these are the things that build a fulfilled life. Watching her embrace life despite the fear of ALS makes Adrian realize that safety is an illusion. By the end, instead of hesitating or needing everything to be okay, Adrian goes after her, showing that he’s ready to seize the life and love he wants, even with all the risks attached. Through Adrian’s transformation, Jimenez shows that living in the present requires the characters to have the courage to risk heartbreak to embrace happiness.
The Transformative Power of Love and Connection
Through Vanessa and Adrian, the novel shows how love and found family can heal old wounds, challenge deep-seated fears, and reshape lives. Their relationship shows that love and connection are transformative forces that won’t eliminate pain and hardship but offer a way through it. Family, biological and chosen, becomes a space where love can either heal or hurt and for Vanessa and Adrian, learning how to redefine family is part of their emotional transformation. Vanessa’s relationship with her family is complicated. She has witnessed firsthand how fragile family ties can be, primarily through her family trauma. Despite this painful history, Vanessa still believes in creating a family by caring for her niece, Grace, nurturing relationships with her YouTube followers, and eventually letting Adrian into her life. Loving and connecting with Grace and Adrian allows Vanessa to heal some of the loneliness she’s carried for so long.
Adrian’s journey with family is equally important. His difficult childhood taught him to protect himself emotionally, believing he couldn’t count on anyone. Through his growing bond with Vanessa and Grace, however, Adrian learns that true family is built on love and sacrifice and can be a safe harbor instead of a source of pain. He realizes that being connected, even imperfectly, is better than staying isolated and secure. Adrian undergoes a significant transformation through his relationship with Vanessa and is forced to confront how these defenses keep him isolated. Vanessa’s fearless approach to life challenges him to relinquish his rigid structures and old grudges. She urges, “Life is too short to hate. Let it go” (189). Through her, he learns that true fulfillment comes not from protecting himself from heartbreak but from fully allowing himself to experience love.
Jimenez uses their relationship to show that love for the characters is not a cure for life’s hardships but a light that makes those hardships bearable and that true love transcends time. Adrian says, “You’re my soul mate. I’ll find you in the next life. Like I found you in this one” (344). Love does not erase the risks Vanessa faces, nor does it fix Adrian’s past scars. Instead, it gives them both the courage to keep moving forward. Their connection becomes a reminder for each that while life is unpredictable, facing it together makes it infinitely richer. The novel emphasizes that opening themselves up to love through parenting, partnership, or friendship can foster a stronger and more healing family than their lives that were previously defined by fear and loneliness. It’s this choice to connect that transforms Adrian and Vanessa’s lives.
Resilience Amid Adversity
Adrian and Vanessa live with the lasting effects of early trauma. Both characters bear emotional scars that shape their perspectives on love, responsibility, and control. While Adrian and Vanessa have experienced adversity, they differ in how they have integrated it into their identities. Adrian deals with the trauma of his father’s abandonment through perfectionism and emotional distance, while Vanessa leans into her family issues through codependence and self-sacrifice—tendencies they must understand, process, and overcome throughout the narrative.
Having grown up with a father who was unreliable and hurtful, Adrian internalized the idea that to be safe, he had to be self-sufficient and perfect. His career success, polished image, and meticulous lifestyle shield him against vulnerability. He cuts ties with his father entirely, believing that excising toxic relationships is the way to protect himself. However, while Adrian appears strong on the surface, his perfectionism isolates him. Adrian’s early form of resilience doesn’t stem from adaptability or emotional courage. Rather, it stems from building walls of emotional protection, walls that Vanessa helps him learn to dismantle. It is only through his relationship with Vanessa that Adrian understands that resilience does not mean never being hurt again. He must have the courage to adapt old coping strategies into healthier ones by embracing connection over control.
Vanessa, by contrast, channels her trauma into relentless giving. Caring for family members who experience addiction and illness, Vanessa became deeply codependent, feeling responsible for everyone else’s well-being. She pours her energy into supporting her family financially, caring for her Grace, connecting with her YouTube followers, and eventually supporting Adrian, all while neglecting her own needs. Vanessa’s resilience masks as fearlessness on the outside, as she embraces life, travels, and seizes every moment. However, it stems from a desperate need to keep others afloat, often at her own expense. She reaches a breaking point, “There was something terrifying in thinking that I might be losing my resiliency. That I might finally be hitting my limit on how much tragedy and despair I could handle” (97). Throughout the novel, she learns that lasting resilience means surviving for others and allowing herself to be cared for and loved. The characters realize that surviving trauma is only the first step, and thriving is the ultimate act of resilience. By choosing each other, Adrian and Vanessa prove that adversity does not have to define the rest of their lives. Instead, it can forge a more openhearted, courageous version of love and life than they believed was possible.
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