Hannah Eastman

Words Between Ours

Other

2023

Beverly feels stuck.After disappointing dating apps and a disparaged hope in love coming from her best friend’s relationship, Beverly wonders if this is twenty-five: living in a cramped Toronto apartment with a roommate you found on Facebook marketplace and another failed talking stage only a week into the New Year.But when Beverly meets The Painter it is kismet. It appears the universe is giving her a sign that there is always time to begin again.Beverly works a dead-end job at a call center and The Painter exists in the side of Toronto that doesn’t seem to be aware of inflation. With both of them struggling through their mid-twenties in opposing ways, Beverly’s belief in soulmates is challenged and she is forced to ask herself, which people get to afford that kind of romantic love and what do you do if the universe decides it’s not yours to keep?Found within the hidden world of Beverly’s notes app, Words Between Ours is a story about being twenty-five, love, heartbreak, and the delusional insanity that all of it can bring out of you.

“i see myself in my main character and i also don’t. i think i’m a lot braver than her. we both don’t know where our lives are going. we’re both a little disappointed in where it’s gone so far. we’re both a bit too daydreamy. i think she wallows a bit too much and i think i’m going to be okay. i very much hope that other people see themselves in beverly and find catharsis through her and also maybe laugh at the ridiculousness of love and heartbreak and crush-induced insanity and also maybe get angry at the link between systemic privileges and dating and that they too feel like they’re going to be okay and that a white boy with a cute smile is in fact just a white boy with a cute smile. ”