“I am living my death, little by little, each day.”

“Everyone can use a little beauty.”

“I’m a girl. Every girl pretends she’s a princess at one point, no matter how little her life is like that. And I like the idea of ‘happily ever after.”

“Every girl pretends she is a princess at one point, no matter how little her life is like that.”

“But I am old now; my life is older. When I made the choice I made, I did not think it was forever. It is another thing to give up so young.”

“I am a coward. I am a cowardly coward, full of cowardice.”

“Still, as I watch the sun journey higher up on the horizon, I appreciate that, for only the second time in my entire life, I am alone, blessedly alone, with no one to tell me what to do or what to wear, no one to have to be polite to. Nothing. But I do not wish to be alone, not entirely. Now that I am finally alone, it feels...lonely.”