“Oh, honey,” she said, her tone echoing Wattie’s. “I’m not sick. I’m only dying.”

“The wold was full of us, the leftovers and the leavers, the bereaved and the broken.”

“I could break things in a thousand ways--anything from surgical dismantling as meticulous as a bomb squad work to wrecking ball style mass destruction. If I broke a thing, it stayed broke. If I broke one of my things, I lived with the pieces, or replaced it.”

“Oh, honey,” she said, her tone echoing Wattie’s. “I’m not sick. I’m only dying.”

“...the way we ended things was not uncommon for kids like us. She said we'd lost enough in our short lives to want to cauterize our wounds before they happened. We burned our connection closed before we felt the holes.”

“I could feel the ghosts of all the girls I'd been behind me in the alleyway, creeping in my wake. I could almost hear my own footsteps as an echo. For a moment it was so real that I spooked myself. I stopped and turned to look. There was only silence and darkness. I walked on.”

“...nothing helps a lie float like a hopeful listener.”

“God gave us crying so other folks could see when we needed help, and help us.”