“Wolfman clears everything off the table except his gun. That he keeps close at hand. There is a sense of ceremony about his actions. My stomach tightens up. We are about to begin.”

“In this otherworldly moment I am profoundly grateful to be here, to be alone, to experience this thing that no one has ever experienced and that no one else ever will.”

“Life isn't fair," comes the voice of Nana. She has told me that a thousand times. "What matters is how you handle it." I'm going to handle it by winning.”

“As I squeeze, he turns his head, and there is the tiniest, slimmest of moments when he sees me. I look into those wolf eyes, and even though they are empty, they're still alive. In that split second he is alive and looking at me. I am alive and looking at him. Then the moment is over, the trigger is pulled back, and the gun is empty.”

“I shut up. I don't fight, I don't scream. Shame rides alongside my terror. But somewhere deep, deep inside, I hear Mom tell me to trust my gut. My gut tells me I am blind and I am lost, and if I fought for freedom now, it would end in my death. I listen to my gut. Because I want to live.”

“Wolfman clears everything off the table except his gun. That he keeps close at hand. There is a sense of ceremony about his actions. My stomach tightens up. We are about to begin.”

“For a while there's nothing I can do but stand in the middle of the road, because going forward hurts too much. Going forward means continuing to try, when trying is so hard. The world is filled with idiots and assholes and monsters. Where are the guardian angels?”

“I have no idea what to do, and everything is starting to feel dangerously hopeless. Hopelessness is not an emotion to be indulged. On the heels of hopelessness comes defeat, and even though everything seems pointless and impossible, I still want to win. Underneath my confusion and utter, bone-crushing fatigue, even though I don't know much of anything at all, I still know I want to win.”

“Through the red haze of my blood I see a strange expression on his face. His eyes have come alive, and I don't like it at all. He's getting off on this now in a way he wasn't before. My first thought is that my honesty is feeding him in a bad, bad way and my second thought is not to question my gut."These are going to be very good days," he says to me.”

“It was like a commercial for laundry detergent or tampons or a prescription medication with death listed as a possible side effect.”

“I know you, Ruth Ann Carver. I know you better than you know yourself. You think you do things right. You think you're a paragon of right living. This is a self-told lie, one bolstered by your coddling parents and grandparents.”