“Letter to Myself, in Remission, from Myself, Terminal"You'll come to hate your own poems,read them as pretty wisps of colorful thinking,all those images just a splash of colored oilsloshed over a pool gone rancid. Admit it.Atheists always scared you. And no wonder.Those nights you switched on the fan so no one could hear you scream into your pillow, weepingand biting your own hands like a motherless monkey,banded to a body that despised you,a suit of coals with a jammed-shut zipper.Instead of the truth, you took refuge in stories and souls, wore the word survivor like a pink nimbus.All the while, my dear, I waited, knowingyou'd catch up to me one day. I'm holding the black-backed mirror to your face. Look into it.”

“You got the makings of greatness in you, but you gotta take the helm and chart your own course! Stick to it, no matter the squalls! And when the time comes, you'll get the chance to really test the cut of your sails and show what you're made of! And... well, I hope I'm there, catching some of the light coming off you that day.”

“It is an adventure called Bertie’s Botheration. A haunting, gothic tale of…” She stopped for the dowager was frantically gesturing to her heart and grinning.“You have read it! It is my favourite book. Ah, I see you love it too. Yes... yes, I understand you could never tell anyone that it is your favourite. Not lofty enough. I keep a few acceptable names in my head every time someone asks me what my favourite book is, but one does not really confess what book they actually really like and have read over and over …”

“Some people wouldn't see a traitor when they looked at me. Some people would see a survivor. Call me anything you like—I sleep fine at night. But you will look at me when you say it. Or I'll get so far in your face you'll be seeing me with your eyes closed. You'll be seeing me in your nightmares. I'll scorch myself on the backs of your eyelids. Get off my back and stay off it. I'm not the woman I used to be. If you want a war with me, you'll get one. Just try me. Give me an excuse to go play in that dark place inside my head.”

“It's difficult admitting you're wrong. Even more difficult admitting it when you have scoffed and otherwise ridiculed the truth with blind, unremitting determination, so blithely confident in your own infallibility. But then one day -- or one night -- the truth is put into your hands, and you realize those stories and songs and legends told by Northern strangers are truths after all, and that no one has lied to you.”

“Theodore, I don’t think I have to tell you but …”“I won’t mention the little incident, your grace. Not even on my deathbed.”“Thank you, but to be safe you should give me your solemn oath.”Theodore repeated his promise with his hand on his heart.“Ah, we have to do his sort of thing correctly. Fetch me a holy book.”

“Do you think I'd leave you alone when you're twisted up like this? I tell you I love you, and it feels like I broke your heart.""No one has ever said that to me. In my life, no one's ever said those words to me.""I'm making you a promise right here that you'll hear them from me every day.”