“She expected a lot of me. When I was in fourth grade working on a book report, she made me start the whole thing over when she read it and said it was barely even legible. "What's wrong with it?" I asked her. "It's not good enough yet. You have to try harder," she said, her voice gentle. "You have to try hard at everything you do. That's all I ask." I rolled my eyes and revised it, and over time her approach wore off on me and I became like her too - wanting to do my best, expecting my best.”

“Nothing is ever enough.”

“Why am I doing this? Because it feels so good to talk like we used to, even though I know this is just a shadow of what we had. But I chase it anyway.”

“But I don't feel like dealing because dealing requires too much energy, and energy is what I lack.”

“But I am tired of everyone being gone, and I am tired of everything that has tired me out for the last five years of my life.”

“Because this is what I believe - that second chances are stronger than secrets. You can let secrets go. But a second chance? You don't let that pass you by.”

“Because maybe it's in the stories that the people we love are still alive.”

“…if you have someone who wants to heal, sometime they will respond to the unconventional. Their minds are more open to healing, so their bodies become more willing too. I believe that medication, while a wonderful thing, has its limits. That there are answers to be found in the unconventional.”

“Sometimes, when we are sad, we have to do the opposite of sad. Sometimes we have to sing.”

“No, I am not all right, I want to say. Have you been to my house? Have you seen how empty it is?”

“Another deserted sentence. Another side effect of death. Words go AWOL.”