“You are the seer. Not quite human, strangely ethereal, ever cryptic, the voice soothed even as it unnerved me. The words were familiar, but every time I thought I remembered where I had heard them, the memory floated just out of my reach.”

“...I opened my eyes as if to a new beginning; nothing I saw was familiar to me, my head was empty, no thoughts, everything quite clean and the sky transparently blue, and I didn't know what I was called or even recognize my own body. Unnamed, I floated around looking at the world for the first time and felt it strangely illuminated and glassily beautiful...”

“I remember thinking to myself that if I ever reached a point in my life where I had to walk to get exercise, it might be time to clean out my ears with a gun.”

“Of course I remember you." My voice is a strangled whisper. I squeeze my eyes shut. "You were the only one who ever looked at me like a human being.”

“And then I heard Nico's voice. It was a song I've never heard before. I struggled to make out the lyrics. "You were my hands," I heard him sing. "You were my eyes. There's nothing left to reach for now, nothing left to see.”

“My French was neither good nor bad. I had enough to understand what people said to me, but speaking was difficult, and there were times when no words came to my lips, when I struggled to say even the simplest things. There was a certain pleasure in this, I believe – to experience language as a collection of sounds, to be forced to the surface of words where meanings vanish – but it was also quite wearing, and it had the effect of shutting me up in my thoughts.”