“At school, I couldn't help but grin.At home, something ripped under my skin when I smiled, trying to pretend that everything was fine. Deadly moods lurked in a purple-white haze, smoke clinging to the curtains, turning stale overnight.”

“But when it came right down to it, the skin of my wrist looked so white and defensless that I couldn't do it. It was as if what I wanted to kill wasn't in that skin or the thin blue pulse that jumped under my thumb, but somewhere else, deeper, more secret, and a whole lot harder to get.”

“Doing something positive will help turn your mood around. When you smile, your body relaxes. When you experience human touch and interaction, it eases tension in your body.”

“The room was very quiet. I walked over to the TV set and turned it on to a dead channel-white noise at maximum decibels, a fine sound for sleeping, a powerful continuous hiss to drown out everything strange.”

“I couldn't help but see; I wasn't blind. I couldn't help but admire; I wasn't dead”

“But I was used to finding something deadly in things that attracted me; there was always something deadly lurking in anything I wanted, anything I loved.”