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And When We Are With Alex, I Might As Well Not Be There. They Speak In A Language Of Whispers And Giggles And Secrets; Their Words Are Like A Fairy-tale Tangle Of Thorns, Which Place A Wall Between Us.

-Lauren Oliver

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And When We Are

Lauren Oliver

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And When We Are With Alex, I Might As Well Not Be There. They Speak In A Language Of Whispers And Giggles And Secrets; Their Words Are Like A Fairy-tale Tangle Of Thorns, Which Place A Wall Between Us.

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Still, The Vivid Green Of The Grass-where The Grass Is Actually Managing To Assert Itself Through The Dirt-seems Out Of Place. This Seems Like A Place Where The Sun Should Never Shine: A Place On The Edge, At The Limit, A Place Completely Removed From Time And Happiness And Life.

For The First Time In My Life I Actually Feel Sorry For Carol. I'm Only Seventeen Years Old, And I Already Know Something She Doesn't Know: I Know That Life Isn't Life If You Just Float Through It. I Know That The Whole Point- The Only Point- Is To Find Things That Matter, And Hold On To Them, And Fight For Them, And Refuse To Let Them Go.

I Am Growing Stronger. I Am A Stone Being Excavated By The Slow Passage Of Water; I Am Wood Charred By A Fire.

Growing Stronger

It's Like A Razor Blade Edging Its Way Through My Organs, Shredding Me, All I Can Think Is: It Will Kill Me, It Will Kill Me, It Will Kill Me. And I Don't Care.

That's All I Want. Just You And Me. Always.

This Is The First Day Of My New Beginning. From Now On I'm Going To Do Things Right. I'm Going To Be A Different Person, A Good Person. I'm Going To Be The Kind Of Person Who Would Be Remembered Well, Not Just Remembered.

The First One, We’ll Name Blue.

I Wonder Whether She Was Sorry For Leaving Us Behind.

Stupid How The Mind Will Try To Distract Itself.

I've Been So Used To Thinking Of What The Borders Are Keeping Out That I Haven't Considered That They're Also Penning Us In.

Amor Deliria Nervosa Isn't A Disease Of Love. It's A Disease Of Selfishness.

My First Kiss. A New Kind Of Kiss, Like The New Kind Of Music Still Playing, Softly, In The Distance - Wild And Arrhythmic, Desperate. Passionate.

In One Of The Tents, Julian Is Sleeping. And In Another: Alex

I Want To Be Healed And Whole And Perfect Again, Like A Misshapen Slab Of Iron That Comes Out Of The Fire Glowing, Glittering, Razor-sharp.

Love, The Deadliest Of All Things: It Kills You Both When You Have It And When You Don't. But That Isn't It, Exactly. The Condemner And The Condemned. The Executioner; The Blade; The Last-minute Reprieve; The Gasping Breath And The Rolling Sky Above You And The Thank You, Thank You, Thank You God. Love: It Will Kill You And Save You, Both.

The Last Laugh, The Last Cup Of Coffee, The Last Sunset, The Last Time You Jump Through A Sprinkler, Or Eat An Ice-cream Cone, Or Stick Your Tongue Out To Catch A Snowflake. You Just Don't Know.

I Wish I Could Close My Eyes And Be Blown Into Dust And Nothingness, Feel All My Thoughts Disperse Like Dandelion Fluff Drifting Off On The Wind. But His Hands Keep Pulling Me Back: Into The Alley, And Portland, And A World That Has Suddenly Stopped Making Sense.

Could It Be? Samantha Kingston? Home? On A Friday?” I Roll My Eyes. “i Don’t Know. Did You Do A Lot Of Acid In The Sixties? Could Be A Flashback.” “i Was Two Years Old In 1960. I Came Too Late For The Party.” He Leans Down And Pecks Me On The Head. I Pull Away Out Of Habit. “and I’m Not Even Going To Ask How You Know About Acid Flashbacks.” “what’s An Acid Flashback?” Izzy Crows. “nothing,” My Dad And I Say At The Same Time, And He Smiles At Me.

And How She Looked At Me Like I Could Save Her From Everything Bad In He World. This Was My Secret: She Was The One Who Saved Me

Po Flickered. "thank You?" It Repeated. "what Is That?" Liesl Thought. "it Means, You Were Wonderful," She Said. "it Means, I Couldn't Have Done It Without You.

Droplets, Droplets: We Are All Identical Drips And Drops Of People, Hovering, Waiting To Be Tipped, Waiting For Someone To Show Us The Way, To Pour Us Down A Path. ... He Has Tipped Us Over, All Of Us In Our Teetering Expectancy, And Now We Are Pouring Toward Him, Coursing On A Wave Of Sound, Of Roaring Shouts And Applause. ... They Are The Moon; We Are A Tide, Their Tide, And Under Their Direction We Will Wipe Clean All The Sickness And Blight From The World.

If You Cross A Line And Nothing Happens, The Line Loses Meaning.

What Is Beauty? Beauty Is No More Than A Trick; A Delusion; The Influence Of Excited Particles And Electrons Colliding In Your Eyes, Jostling In Your Brain Like A Bunch Of Overeager School Children, About To Be Released On Break. Will You Let Yourself Be Deluded? Will You Let Yourself Be Decieved? -"on Beauty And Falsehood," The New Philosophy, By Ellen Dorpshire

If You Want Something, If You Take It For Your Own, You'll Always Be Taking It From Someone Else.

I Know That The Whole Point—the Only Point—is To Find The Things That Matter, And Hold On To Them, And Fight For Them, And Refuse To Let Them Go.

And Even Though I'm Standing In The Middle Of The Biggest Crowd I've Ever Seen In My Life, I Suddenly Feel Very Alone.

I'm Gone, Lost, Floating Away Into Nothingness Like I Am In My Dream, But This Time It's A Good Feeling - Like Soaring, Like Being Totally Free, And I Can Feel The Impression Of His Fingers Everywhere That They Touch, And I Think Of Stars Streaking Through The Sky And Leaving Burning Trails Behind Them, And In That Moment - However Long It Lasts, Seconds, Minutes, Days - While He's Saying My Name Into My Mouth And I'm Breathing Into Him, I Realize This, Right Here, Is The First And Only Time I've Ever Been Kissed In My Life.

The Kidnapping, The Kiss. I Brought Him Here, After All. I Rescue Him An Pulled Him Into This New Life, A Life Of Freedom And Feeling.

Huamns, Uregulated, Are Cruel And Capricious; Violet And Selfish; Miserable And Quarrelsome. It Is Only After Their Instincts And Basic Emotions Have Been Controlled That They Can Be Happy, Generous, And Good.

I've Never Really Thought About It Before, But It's A Miracle How Many Kinds Of Light There Are In The World, How Many Skies: The Pale Brightness Of Spring, When It Feels Like The Hole World's Blushing; The Lush, Bright Boldness Of A July Noon; Purple Storm Skies And A Green Queasiness Just Before Lightning Strikes And Crazy Multicolored Sunsets That Look Like Someone's Acid Trip.

But Maybe Happiness Isn't In The Choosing. Maybe It's In The Fiction, In The Pretending: That Wherever We Have Ended Up Is Where We Intended To Be All Along.

But The Guilt Goes Even Deeper Than That. It, Too, Is Dust: Layers And Layers Of It Have Accumulated. Because If It Weren’t For Me, Lena And Alex Would Never Have Been Caught At All. I Told On Them. I Was Jealous. God Forgive Me, For I Have Sinned.

I’ve Been Trying So Hard Not To Think His Name, Not To Even Breathe The Idea Of Him

The Sparrows Jumped Before They Knew How To Fly, And They Learned To Fly Only Because They Had Jumped.

Of All The Systems Of The Body - Neurological, Cognitive, Special, Sensory - The Cardiological System Is The Most Sensitive And Easily Disturbed. The Role Of Society Must Be To Shelter These Systems From Infection And Decay, Or Else The Future Of The Human Race Is At Stake. Like A Summer Fruit That Is Protected From Insect Invasion, Bruising, And Rot By The Whole Mechanism Of Modern Farming; So Must We Protect The Heart.

And There It Is: Even Though We’re Standing In The Same Patch Of Sun-drenched Pavement, We Might As Well Be A Hundred Thousand Miles Apart.

I Feel An Overwhelming Rush Of Sadness... I'm Just Struck With A Sense Of Time Passing So Quickly, Rushing Forward. One Day I'll Wake Up And My Whole Life Will Be Behind Me, And It Will Seem To Have Gone As Quickly As A Dream.

It's Weird How Much People Change. For Example, When I Was A Kid I Loved All Of These Things..and Over Time All Of Them Just Fell Away, One After Another, Replaced By Friends And Iming And Cell Phones And Boys And Clothes. It's Kind Of Sad, If You Think About It. Like There's No Continuity In People At All. Like Something Ruptures When You Hit Twelve, Or Thirteen, Or Whatever The Age Is When You're No Longer A Kid But A "young Adult," And After That You're A Totally Different Person. Maybe Even A Less Happy Person. Maybe Even A Worse One.

Willing Me To Understand: That People Should Be Sacrificed To Causes, That Beauty Can Be Built On The Backs Of The Dead.

Here's Another Thing To Remember: Hope Keeps You Alive. Even When You're Dead, It's The Only Thing That Keeps You Alive.

That’s What You Do For Family. Anything.

That's When I Realized That Certain Moments Go On Forever. Even After They're Over They Still Go On, Even After You're Dead And Buried, Those Moments Are Lasting Still, Backward And Forward, On Into Infinity. They Are Everything And Everywhere All At Once. They Are The Meaning.

That's The Thing: We Didn't Really Care. A World Without Love Is Also A World Without Stakes.

There Is So Much Fragility In Kissing, In Other People: It Is All Glass.

People Do Terrible Things, Sometimes, For The Best Reasons.

Chance. Stupid, Dumb, Blind Chance. Just A Part Of The Strange Mechanism Of The World, With Its Fits And Coughs And Starts And Random Collisions.

The Reason You Can Never Go Home Again Isn't Necessarily That Places Change, But People Do. So Nothing Ever Looks The Same.

So Far I've Seen The Life Studies Packet Used As (1) An Umbrella, (2) A Makeshift Towel, (3) A Pillow, And Now This. I Have Never Actually Seen Anyone Study With It, Which Either Means That Everyone Who Graduates From Thomas Jefferson Will Be Totally Unprepared For Life Or That Certain Things Can't Be Learned In Bullet-point Format.

I Was Glad When The Invalids Were Executed

We Wanted The Freedom To Love. We Wanted The Freedom To Choose. Now We Have To Fight For It.

Fighting For Love

They've Lied About Everything.-about The Fence, And The Existence Of Invalids, About A Million Other Things Besides. They Told Us The Raids Were Carried Out For Our Own Protection. They Told Us The Regulators Were Only Interested In Keeping The Peace. They Told Us Love Was A Disease. They Told Us It Would Kill Us In The End. For The Very First Time I Realize, That This, Too, Maight Also Be A Lie.

I’ve Never Really Had A Party Before.” “why Did You Have One Now?” I Say, Just To Keep Him Talking. He Gives A Half Laugh. “i Thought If I Had A Party, You Would Come.

The Story Of Solomon Is The Only Way I Know How To Explain. And Then, In Smaller Letters: Forgive Me.

For A Second We Just Stand There In Silence. Then, Suddenly, Alex Is Back, Easy And Smiling Again. “i Left A Note For You One Time. In The Governor’s Fist, You Know?” I Left A Note For You One Time. It’s Impossible, Too Crazy To Think About, And I Hear Myself Repeating, “you Left A Note For Me?” “i’m Pretty Sure It Said Something Stupid. Just Hi, And A Smiley Face, And My Name. But Then You Stopped Coming.” He Shrugs. “it’s Probably Still There. The Note, I Mean. Probably Just A Bit Of Paper Pulp By Now.

This Is What We Are Made For: Promises, Pledges, And Sworn Oaths Of Obedience.

Perhaps This Was How The Sparrows Did It Too; Perhaps They Were Looking So Hard At The Peaks And Tips Of The New Rooftops Coated With Dew, And The Vast New Horizon, That They Only Forgot That They Did Not Know How To Fly Until They Were Already In Midair.

Everything Ends, People Move On, They Don't Look Back. It's How They Should Be.

Everywhere He Touches Is Fire. My Whole Body Is Burning Up, The Two Of Us Becoming Twin Points Of The Same Bright White Flame.

There's Always Some Relief In Giving Up.

..in That Moment I Realize How Much I Love The Little Everyday Routines Of My Life..the Details That Are My Life's Special Pattern, Like How In Handwoven Rugs What Really Makes Them Unique Are The Tiny Flaws In The Stitching, Little Gaps And Jumps And Stutters That Can Never Be Reproduced. So Many Things Become Beautiful When You Really Look.

Everyday Routine

We Are All Punished For The Lives We Have Chosen, In One Way Or Another.

The Flip Side Of Freedom Is This: When You're Completely Free, You're Also Completely On Your Own.

Maybe Next Time, But Probably Not.

Maybe Next Time

I Get That Rush That Comes When You Know You're Doing Something Wrong And Are Getting Away With It, Like Stealing From The School Cafeteria Of Getting Tipsy At A Family Holiday Without Anyone Knowing It.

There's A Place For Everything And Everyone, You Know. That Is The Mistake They Make Above. They Think That Only Certain People Have A Place. Only Certain Kinds Of People Belong. The Rest Is Waste. But Even Waste Must Have A Place. Otherwise It Will Clog And Clot, And Rot And Fester.

My Heart Is Fluid And Soaring. There's No Longer Any Space Between Heartbeats.

But That's The Problem With Love - It Acts On You, Works Through You, Resists Your Attempts To Control.

Love Is A Kind Of Possession. It’s A Poison.

It's Like There's A Filter Set Up In My Brain, Except Instead Of Making Things Better, It Twists Everything Around So What Comes Out Of My Mouth Is Totally Wrong, Totally Different From What I Was Thinking.

He’s Speaking In The Tone Of Voice That Everyone Uses When They’re About To Break You Apart. Gentle—kind, Even—like They Can Make The News Sound Better Just By Speaking In A Lullaby Voice.

This Is The Language Of The World Before—a World Of Chaos And Confusion And Happiness And Despair—before The Blitz Turned Streets To Grids, Cities To Prisons, And Hearts To Dust.

Unhappiness Is Bondage; Therefore, Happiness Is Freedom.

Dystopian Novels Help People Process Their Fears About What The Future Might Look Like; Further, They Usually Show That There Is Always Hope, Even In The Bleakest Future.

We Can Never Understand. We Can Only Try, Fumbling Our Way Through The Tunneled Places, Reaching For Light.

I Put My Forehead On His Collarbone, Place One Hand On His Chest. Its Rhythm Reassures Me: He Is Real, And He Is Now.

His Secret Name, Which Belongs To Me, And To Him, And To No One Else.

It's Funny, Isn't It? When You Are Young You Just Want To Be Old, And Then Later You Wish You Could Go Back To Being A Kid.

I Start To Follow Her, And Alex Grabs My Hand. "i'll Find You," He Says, Watching Me With The Eyes I Remember. "i Won't Let You Go Again." I Don't Trust Myself To Speak. Instead I Nod, Hoping That He Understands Me. He Squeezes My Hand. "go," He Says.

The Devil Stole Into The Garden Of Eden. He Carried With Him The Disease - Amor Deliria Nervosa - In The Form Of A Seed. It Grew And Flowered Into A Magnificent Apple Tree, Which Bore Apples As Bright As Blood. -from Genesis: A Complete History Of The World And The Known Universe, By Steven Horace, Phd, Harvard University

It's Amazing How Words Can Do That, Just Shred Your Insides Apart. Sticks And Stones May Break My Bones, But Words Can Never Hurt Me - Such Bullshit.

That’s What Made It So Frightening To The Lawmakers: Love Obeys No Laws Other Than Its Own.

Lies Are Just Stories, And Stories Are All That Matter. We All Tell Stories. Some Are More Truthful Than Others, Maybe, But In The End The Only Thing That Counts Is What You Can Make People Believe.

We're Killers, All Of Us: We Kill Our Lives, Our Past Selves, The Things That Mattered. We Bury Them Under Slogans And Excuses.

Mice? Fine. Flying Mice? Not So Fine.

In My Dream I Know I Am Falling. But There Is No Up Or Down, No Walls Or Sides Or Ceilings, Just The Sensation Of Cold And Darkness Everywhere. I Am So Scared I Could Scream. But When I Open My Mouth, Nothing Happens. And I Wonder If You Fall Forever And Never Touch Down, Is It Really Still Falling? I Think I Will Fall Forever.

Because I Think You're Right. You Can Make A Difference." He Told Me Experiences Were Kind Of Like Fate, And Fate Usually Came In The Form Of A Test. He Told Me Fate Liked To Be Worshiped. It Liked To See Us Fall On Out Knees Before It Offered To Help Us Up..." ♥

That Is The Rule Of The Wilds: You Must Be Bigger And Stronger And Tougher. You Must Hurt Or Be Hurt.

I Feel Like I'm Playing Some Giant Video Game, Or Trying To Solve A Really Complicated Math Equation. 'one Girl Is Trying To Avoid Forty Raiding Parties Of Between Fifteen To Twenty People Each, Spread Out Across A Radius Of Seven Miles. If She Has To Make It 2.7 Miles Through The Center, What Is The Probablitiy She Will Wake Up Tomorrow Morning In A Jail Cell? Please Feel Free To Round Pi To 3.14'.

It Occurs To Me That For A Long Time She Has Been Doing Her Own Version Of Resisting.

Love: A Single Word, A Wispy Thing, A Word No Bigger Or Longer Than An Edge.

And I Guess That's When It Starts To Hit Me: The Whole Point Is, You Do What You Can.

A String Of Bright White Buildinh, Glistening Like Teeth Over The Slurping Mouth Of The Ocean.

Lindsay Calls Them The Pugs: Pretty From Far Away, Ugly Up Close.

I Start To Back Away Before I Do Something Wildly Inappropriate, Like Jump On Top Of Him.

It's Not My Fault I Can't Be Like You, Okay? I Don't Get Up In The Morning Thinking The World Is One Big, Shiny, Happy Place, Okay? That's Just Not How I Work. I Don't Think I Can Be Fixed.

No Wonder The Regulators Decided On Segregation Of Boys And Girls: Otherwise, It Would Have Been A Nightmare, This Feeling Angry And Self-conscious And Confused And Annoyed All The Time.

No One Had Ever Told Her This Basic Fact: Not Everyone Got To Be Loved.

I Love You. Remember. And Someday, I Will Find You Again.

There Is No Before. There Is Only Now, And What Comes Next.

That's The Thing About Best Friends. That's What They Do. They Keep You From Spinning Off The Edge.

In My Head I Try And Reach Back, Through The Fence, Past The Smoke; I Try And Grab His Hand And Pull. Alex, Come Back. There Is Nothing To Do But Sink. The Hours Close Around Me, Encase Me Completely, Like A Tomb.

It Won't Matter If Nobody Ever Thinks I'm Pretty (although Sometimes I Wish, Just For A Second, That Somebody Would)

There Are More Of Us Than You Think.

Amor Deliria Nervosa: It Affects Your Mind So That You Cannot Think Clearly, Or Make Rational Decisions About Your Own Well-being. Symptom Number Twelve.

I Love You. Remember. They Cannot Take It

Funny How Certain Things Stay With You.

And When We Are With Alex, I Might As Well Not Be There. They Speak In A Language Of Whispers And Giggles And Secrets; Their Words Are Like A Fairy-tale Tangle Of Thorns, Which Place A Wall Between Us.

It's Going To Be Okay. Words That Mean Nothing. Really, Just Sounds Intoned Into Vastness And Darkness, Little Scrabbling Attempts To Latch On To Something When We're Falling.

Hate Isn’t The Most Dangerous Thing, He’d Said. Indifference Is.

If You’re Smart, You Care. And If You Care, You Love.

I'm Used To A Feeling Of Doubleness, Of Thinking One Thing And Having To Do Another, A Constant Tug-of-war.

Droplets, Droplets: We Are All Identical Drips And Drops Of People, Hovering, Waiting To Be Tipped, Waiting For Someone To Show Us The Way, To Pour Us Down A Path.

I Remember A Story I Once Heard About Drowning: That When You Fall Into Cold Water It's Not That You Drown Right Away But That The Cold Disorients You And Makes You Think That Down Is Up And Up Is Down, So You May Be Swimming, Swimming, Swimming For Your Life In The Wrong Direction, All The Way Toward The Bottom Until You Sink. That's How I Feel, As Though Everything Has Been Turned Around.

Not Gray, Exactly. Right Before The Sun Rises There's A Moment When The Whole Sky Goes This Pale Nothing Color-not Really Gray But Sort Of, Or Sort Of White, And I've Always Really Liked It Because It Reminds Me Of Waiting For Something Good To Happen.

You Have To Understand. I Am No One Special. I Am Just A Single Girl. I Am Five Feet Two Inches Tall And I Am In-between In Every Way. But I Have A Secret. You Can Build Walls All The Way To The Sky And I Will Find A Way To Fly Above Them. You Can Try To Pin Me Down With A Hundred Thousand Arms, But I Will Find A Way To Resist.

It's A Miracle I Was Able To Get Out Of The House Today. It's A Miracle I'm Even Wearing Pants, A Double Miracle I Remembered To Wear Shoes.

Two Weeks Until Your Cure" She Says Finally. "sixteen Days" I Say, But In My Head I'm Counting: Seven Days. Seven Days Until I'm Free And Away From All These People And Their Sliding Superficial Lives Brushing Past One Another Gliding, Gliding, Gliding From Life To Death. For Them There's Hardly A Change Between The Two.

Popularity's A Weird Thing. You Can't Really Define It, And It's Not Cool To Talk About, But You Know It When You See It. Like A Lazy Eye, Or Porn.

But How Could Anyone Who's Ever Seen A Summer - Big Explosion Of Green And Skies Lit Up Electric With Splashy Sunsets, A Riot Of Flowers And Wind That Smells Like Honey - Pick The Snow?

All Of You, Wherever You Are: In Your Spiny Cities, Or Your One-bump Towns. Find It, The Hard Stuff, The Links Of Metal And Chink, The Fragments Of Stone Filling Your Stomach. And Pull, And Pull, And Pull. I Will Make A Pact With You: I Will Do It If You Will Do It, Always And Forever. Take Down The Walls.

He Is Looking At Me Through The Smoke, Across The Fence. He Never Takes His Eyes Off Me. His Hair Is A Crown Of Leaves, Of Thorns, Of Flames. His Eyes Are Blazing With Light, More Light Than All The Lights In Every City In The Whole World, More Light Than We Could Ever Invent If We Had Ten Thousand Billion Years.

For A Second, I Feel A Sense Of Overwhelming Grief: For How Things Change, For The Fact That We Can Never Go Back. I'm Not Certain Of Anything Anymore. I Don't Know What Will Happen--

That's The Beauty Of The Cure. No One Mentions Those Lost, Hot Days In The Field, When Thomas Kissed Rachel's Tears Away And Invented Worlds Just So He Could Promise Them To Her, When She Tore The Skin Off Her Own Arm At The Thought Of Living Without Him.

Things That Don't Matter When You've Lived The Same Day Six Times And Died On At Least Two Of Them: Lunch Meats And Their Relative Coolness.

That Is The Strangest Thing About The World: How It Looks So Different From Every Point Of View.

But From The Beginning, I Knew That In A World Where Destiny Was Dead, I Was Destined, Forever, To Love Him. Even Though He Didn't - Though He Couldn't - Ever Love Me Back.

....love And Desire Enjoy A Symbiotic Relationship, Meaning That One Cannot Exist Without The Other. Desire Is An Enemy To Contentment; Desire Is Illness, A Feverish Brain. Who Can Be Considered Healthy Who Wants? The Very Word Want Suggests A Lack, An Impoverishment, And That Is What Desire Is: An Impoverishment Of The Brain, A Flaw, A Mistake.

For A Moment, My Heart Aches For Him. I Should Never Have Asked Him To Join Me Here; I Should Never Have Asked Him To Cross.

Until, One Day, She Wasn’t.

Most Things, Even The Greatest Movements On Earth, Have Their Beginnings In Something Small. An Earthquake That Shatters A City Might Begin With A Tremble, A Breath. Music Begins With A Vibration . . . And God Created The Whole Universe From An Atom No Bigger Than A Thought.

I Was Glad When The Invalids Were Executed. Some People Complained That Lethal Injection Was Too Humane For Convicted Terrorists, But I Thought It Sent A Powerful Message: We Are Not The Evil Ones. We Are Reasonable And Compassionate. We Stand For Fairness, Structure, And Organization. It’s The Other Side, The Uncureds, Who Bring The Chaos.

What Does It Feel Like To Be Infected?" "i-- I Can't Describe It." I Force The Words Out. Can't Breathe, Can't Breathe, Can't Breathe. His Skin Smells Like Smoke From A Wood Fire, Like Soap, Like Heaven. I Imagine Tasting His Skin; I Imagine Biting His Lips. "i Want To Know." His Words Are A Whisper, Barely Audible. "i Want To Know With You.

Less Than A Month Ago All Of August Still Stretched Before Us - Long And Golden And Reassuring, Like An Endless Period Of Delicious Sleep.

So Many Things Become Beautiful When You Really Look.

I Thought The Invalids Were Beasts; I Thought They Would Rip Me Apart. But These People Saved Me, And Gave Me The Softest Place To Sleep, And Nursed Me Back To Health, And Haven't Asked For Anything In Return. The Animals Are On The Other Side Of The Fence: Monsters Wearing Uniforms. They Speak Softly, And Tell Lies, And Smile As They're Slitting Your Throat.

Suicide. A Sideways Word, A Word That People Whisper And Mutter And Cough: A Word That Must Be Squeezed Out Behind Cupped Palms Or Murmured Behind Closed Doors. It Was Only In Dreams That I Heard The Word Shouted, Screamed.

The Hours Here Are Flat And Round, Disks Of Gray Layered One On Top Of The Other...they Move Slowly, At A Grind, Until It Seems As Though They Are Not Moving At All. They Are Just Pressing Down.

You Can't Be Happy Unless You're Unhappy Sometimes".

People Are Like Houses. They Could Open Their Doors. You Could Walk Through Their Rooms And Touch The Objects Hidden In Their Corners. But Something--the Structure, The Wiring, The Invisible Mechanism That Kept The Whole Thing Standing--remai Ned Invisible, Suggested Only By The Fact Of Its Existing At All.

Sarah: "not Bad. You Look Almost Human." Lena: "thanks." Sarah: "i Said Almost." Lena: "well, Then, Almost Thanks.

Love: A Single Word, A Wispy Thing, A Word No Bigger Or Longer Than An Edge. That's What It Is: An Edge; A Razor. It Draws Up Through The Center Of Your Life, Cutting Everything In Two. Before And After. The Rest Of The World Falls Away On Either Side.

And For A Moment―for A Split Second―everything Else Falls Away, The Whole Pattern And Order Of My Life, And A Huge Joy Crests In My Chest. I Am No One, And I Owe Nothing To Anybody, And My Life Is My Own.

I'll Find You," He Says, Watching Me With The Eyes I Remember. "i Won't Let You Go Again

You Have To Learn That People Are Always Listening.

He Was Still In Love With You, Anyway.

I Didn't Even Know A Heart Could Beat So Loudly...it Reminds Me Of An Edgar Allen Poe Story We Had To Read In One Of Our...classes...it's Supposed To Be A Story About Guilt And The Dangers Of Civil Disobedience, But When I First Read It I Thought It Seemed Kind Of Lame And Melodramatic. Now I Get It, Though. Poe Must Have Snuck Out A Lot When He Was Young.

Everything I See And Touch Reminds Me Of Him, And So Everything I See And Touch Is Perfect.

I'm Not Ugly But I'm Not Pretty Either. Everything Is In-between. I Have Eyes That Aren't Green Or Brown, But A Muddle. I'm Not Thin But I'm Not Fat Either. The Only Thing You Could Definitely Say About Me Is That: I'm Short

It's As Though The Words Are Trapped, Buried Under Past Fears, Past Lives, Like Fossils Compressed Under Layers Of Dirt.

I Don't Know Where To Go. I Don't Know What Comes Now." "don't Worry," Will Said. "we'll Figure Something Out." Liesl Managed To Smile At Him. She Liked That Word: *we*. It Sounded Warm And Open, Like A Hug.

And Then, Just At That Moment, When I'm No Longer Sure If I'm Dreaming Or Awake Or Walking Some Valley In Between Where Everything You Wish For Comes True, I Feel The Flutter Of His Lips On Mine.

He Is No Longer Mine To Lose, But The Grief Is There, A Gnawing Sense Of Disbelief.

My Stomach Gets That Hollowed-out Feeling. It's Amazing How Words Can Do That, Just Shred Your Insides Apart.

That Was What Her Parents Did Not Understand—and Had Never Understood—about Stories. Liza Told Herself Storied As Though She Was Weaving And Knotting An Endless Rope. Then, No Matter How Dark Or Terrible The Pit She Found Herself In, She Could Pull Herself Out, Inch By Inch And Hand Over Hand, On The Long Rope Of Stories.

You Have To Understand. I Wasn't Just Thinking Of Me. I Was Thinking Of Her, Too.

Thinking Of Her

I Think Of The Quietness Of Julian's Voice As He Said I Love You, The Steadiness Of His Rib Cage Rising And Falling Against My Back, As We Sleep.i Love You, Julian. But The Words Don't Come.

I Hate Both Of My Parents Right Now: For Sitting Quietly In Our House, While Out In The Darkness My Heart Was Beating Away All Of The Seconds Of My Life, Ticking Them Off One By One Until My Time Was Up; For Letting The Thread Between Us Stretch So Far And So Thin That The Moment It Was Severed For Good They Didn't Even Feel It.

I Used To Think That's What Love Was: Knowing Someone So Well He Was Like A Part Of You.

But That's The Beauty Of Life: Time Is Yours To Keep And To Change. Just A Few Minutes Can Be Sufficient To Carve A New Road, A New Track. Just A Few Minutes, And The Void Is Kept At Bay. You Will Live Forever With That New Road Inside Of You, Stretching Away To A Place Suggested, Barely, On The Horizon. For The Shortest Time, Shorter Than The Shortest Second's Breath, You Get To Stand Up To Infinity. But Eventually, And Always, Infinity Wins.

I'd Rather Die On My Own Terms Than Live On Theirs. I'd Rather Die Loving Alex Than Live Without Him.

I Know The Rules. I've Been Living Here Longer Than You Have." He Cracks A Smile Then. He Nudges Me Back. "hardly." "born And Raised. You're A Transplant." I Nudge Him Again, A Little Harder, And He Laughs And Tries To Catch Hold Of My Arm. I Squirm Away, Giggling, And He Stretches Out To Tickle My Stomach. "country Bumpkin!" I Squeal, As He Grabs Out And Wrestles Me Back Onto The Blanket, Laughing. "city Slicker," He Says, Rolling Over On Top Of Me, And Then Kisses Me. Everything Dissolves: Heat, Explosions Of Color, Floating.

Nobody Ever Said Life Was Fair.

I Know The Past Will Drag You Backward And Down, Have You Snatching At Whispers Of Wind And The Gibberish Of Trees Rubbing Together, Trying To Decipher Some Code, Trying To Piece Together What Was Broken. It's Hopeless. The Past Is Nothing But A Weight. It Will Build Inside You Like A Stone.

That's What It Was Like Waking Up In The Crypts. No-longer-dead. But Without Her. Like Burning Alive.

If Singing Were A Feeling It Would Be This, This Light, This Lifting, Like Laughing.

Waste Today, Want Tomorrow.

Things Change After You Die, Though, I Guess Because Dying Is The Loneliest Thing You Can Do.

Someday She Will Be Saved, And The Past And All Its Pain Will Be Rendered As Smoothly Palatable As The Food We Spoon To Our Babies.

We’ll Go.” Her Voice Is Surprisingly Deep And Forceful. Set In Her Sunken, Shipwreck Face, Her Eyes Burn Like Two Smoldering Coals. “we’ll Fight.

The Only Thing Worse Than Having No Friends Is Being Pitied For Having No Friends.

Please Understand. Please Forgive Me. I Prayed Every Day For You To Be Alive, Until Hope Became Painful. Don't Hate Me. I Still Love You.

When He Speaks Again, I Can Tell That He's Smiling. "so I Guess We Saved Each Other.

We All Need Mantras, I Guess - Stories We Tell Ourselves To Keep Us Going.

The Mark Of The Procedure. A Real One. Lu Is Cured.

Hunky Heroes, Rescuing Distressed Women, Captive Princesses, And Girls Without Wheels Since 1684. P. 450

But Now I Give In, Let The Anger Surge. I'm Sick Of People Acting Like This World, This Other World Is The Normal One, While I'm The Freak. It's Not Fair; Like All The Rules Have Suddenly Changed And Somebody Forgot To Tell Me.

Live Free Or Die. Four Words. Thirteen Letters. Ridges, Bumps, Swirls Under My Fingertips. Another Story. We Cling Tightly To It, And Our Belief Turns It To Truth.

And When It Started To Get Dark You Pointed To The Sky, And Told Me There Was A Star For Every Thing You Loved About Me.

I've Learned To Get Really Good At This - Say One Thing When I'm Thinking About Something Else, Act Like I'm Listening When I'm Not, Pretend To Be Calm And Happy When I'm Really Freaking Out. It's One Of The Skills You Perfect As You Get Older

You Came Form Different Starts And You'll Come To Different Ends.

I Guess There Are Some Things You Never Get Used To.

I Feel A Flash Of Grief So Intense It Almost Makes Me Cry Out: Not For What I Lost, But For The Chances I Missed.

I Didn't Realize Then What A Privilege That Was: To Be Bored With Your Best Friend; To Have Time To Waste.

You Don't Reach Points In Life At Which Everything Is Sorted Out For Us. I Believe In Endings That Should Suggest Our Stories Always Continue.

My Boyfriend's An Idiot," I Say As Soon As He Lurches Away."a Cute Idiot," Ally Corrects Me."that's Like Saying 'a Cute Mutant.' Doesn't Exist.

Rainstorms Are Incredible: Falling Shards Of Glass, The Air Full Of Diamonds.

And You Should Hear The Music. Incredible, Amazing Music, Like Nothing You've Ever Heard, Music That Almost Takes Your Head Off, You Know? That Makes You Want To Scream And Jump Up And Down And Break Stuff And Cry.

We Leave Pippa Behind, Standing In The Dark, Teeming Bowels Of The Camp, While The Sun Begins To Stain The Sky Electric, And From All Sides The Guns Draw Closer.

How Can Someone Have The Power To Shatter You To Dust--and Also To Make You Feel So Whole?

It Is War Now, And Armies Need Symbols.

You Can Build Walls All The Way To The Sky And I Will Find A Way To Fly Above Them.

As Soon As I Look Up, His Eyes Click Onto My Face. The Breath Whooshes Out Of My Body And Everything Freezes For A Second, As Though I’m Looking At Him Through My Camera Lens, Zoomed In All The Way, The World Pausing For That Tiny Span Of Time Between The Opening And Closing Of The Shutter.

Love At First Sight

He's Stuck With Me And I'm Stuck With Him. We're Stuck. That's What Growing Up Is All About, I Guess.

Mama, Mama, Help Me Get Home I'm Out In The Woods, I Am Out On My Own. I Found Me A Werewolf, A Nasty Old Mutt It Showed Me Its Teeth And Went Straight For My Gut. Mama, Mama, Help Me Get Home I'm Out In The Woods, I Am Out On My Own. I Was Stopped By A Vampire, A Rotting Old Wreck It Showed Me Its Teeth And Went Straight For My Neck. Mama, Mama, Put Me To Bed I Won't Make It Home, I'm Already Half-dead. I Met An Invalid, And Fell For His Art He Showed Me His Smile, And Went Straight For My Heart. -from "a Child's Walk Home," Nursery Rhymes And Folk Tales

Maybe He Sees It On My Face, That Fraction Of A Second When I Let My Guard Down, Because In That Moment His Expression Softens And His Eyes Go Bright As Flame And Even Though I Barely See Him Move, Suddenly He Has Closed The Space Between Us And He’s Wrapping His Warm Hands Over My Shoulders—fingers So Warm And Strong I Almost Cry Out—and Saying, “lena. I Like You, Okay? That’s It. That’s All. I Like You.” His Voice Is So Low And Hypnotic It Reminds Me Of A Song. I Think Of Predators Dropping Silently From Trees: I Think Of Enormous Cats With Glowing Amber Eyes, Just Like His.

I Close My Eyes. An Image Flashes—emerging From The Van With Julian After Our Escape From New York City; Believing, In That Moment, That We Had Escaped The Worst, That Life Would Begin Again For Us. Instead Life Has Only Grown Harder.

I Know What The Problem Is, Of Course. The Disorientation, The Distraction, The Difficulty Focusing - All Classic Phase One Signs Of Deliria. But I Don't Care. If Pneumonia Felt This Good I'd Stand Out In The Snow In The Winter With Bare Feet And No Coat, Or March Into The Hospital And Kiss Pneumonia Patients

The House, The Pond, The Tree-it Was All Both Overwhelmingly Familiar And Different From What She Remembered-smaller And Shabbier, Somehow. It Was Like Waking Up To Find That Your Reflection In The Mirror Had Aged Overnight, Or Had Sprouted A New Mole: You Were Forced To Admit That Things Changed, Whether You Gave Them Permission To Or Not.

An Eye For An Eye." "and The Whole World Goes Blind," Coral Puts In Quietly.

Despite The Fact That Raven And Tack Are Often Fighting, It's Impossible To Imagine One Without The Other. They Are Like Two Plants That Have Grown Around Each Other - They Strangle And Squeeze And Support At The Same Time.

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Edwin Louis Cole

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