“-This is really a very deep and maybe hopeless winter night – I say on me foolishly.My fear hasn’t disappeared. This time however, I feel the slight cold from the snowflakes on my face and I am smiling.”

“And there is enchantment in the very hour I am now spending with you. Who can tell what a dark, dreary, hopeless life I have dragged on for months past? Doing nothing, expecting nothing; merging night in day; feeling but the sensation of cold when I let the fire go out, of hunger when I forgot to eat: and then a ceaseless sorrow, and, at times, a very delirium of desire to behold my Jane again. Yes: for her restoration I longed, far more than for that of my lost sight. How can it be that Jane is with me, and says she loves me? Will she not depart as suddenly as she came? To-morrow, I fear I shall find her no more.”

“Leo: “I can’t believe I thought you were hot.” Khione’s face turned red. “Hot? You dare insult me? I am cold, Leo Valdez. Very, very cold.”

“I leaned out one last time and caught a snowflake on my tongue. They tasted so good, so pure and so divine, like nothing I had ever tasted from the sky. It was as if happiness spread through your body with the cold, but then disappeared and brought depression, all in less then two seconds. It was unbelievable, and yet, addicting.”

“I am so sad. I am so sad it makes me heavier than the sum of my parts. I shift, restless, but it doesn’t help. It’s like—time. All this time in here is on me, has its hooks in me. Maybe if I sleep more, I’ll wake up and I’ll feel different, but I can’t. The storm is really happening now and it makes the room feel emptier. Makes me feel emptier.”

“I forgive him and like water draining from the sand after a wave, the power he held over me disappears. A slow smile rises on my face.”