“Your past wouldn’t frighten me,” I said, buckling my seat belt across my lap. “I’m guessing I’d be more appalled than anything.”

“He huffed. I twisted to the left, leaned over him, and reached around his body.“What are you doing?” he asked, alarmed.“I’m hugging you goodbye,” I said. “What do you think I’m doing? I’m putting your seatbelton.”I pulled the belt across his chest and wrestled it into the buckle. Then I sat back and fastenedmine.“Seat belts save lives,” I said, annoyed.”

“I get up, because I’m supposed to, but if it were up to me, I’d stay in my seat for the rest of time.”

“The seat belt irked his father more than Uncle Colin's not eating meat, because, though his father never said it, Larry knew he considered seat belts cowardly.”

“(My momma + curvy roads= wear your seat belt.”

“I wondered what I’d end up looking like once I bloomed. I couldn’t even guess. If I had to be stuck in my own skinny, gawky, coltish body forever… well. It probably wouldn’t be so bad.I wouldn’t mind a little more in the chest, though. But wild horses wouldn’t drag that out of me. Ever.”