“No matter how we suffer, we have an obligation to others. We have to be unselfish enough to try to live in the right way, so others can get through their own lives without us fouling them up.”

“If it's easy to be friendly she will be. If the wind blows the other way her friendship will be gone. And I'm thinking the wind is blowing the other way. She has found some other way to be an important person in her own right by hating others.”

“We could go back to your house. I can stay with you always. We can know each others bodies in every way, night after night. I could love you. I could work, you would not be poor. I would help you.”

“There’s no way you can kill someone and get to the other side of the experience unchanged.”

“I have lived one step away from losing my mind for years. I am quick and accurate in spotting unstable streaks in others.”

“We could go back," he said. In the dome light of the car, his face looked hard as stone. "We could go back to your house. I can stay with you always. We can know each other's bodies in every way, night after night. I could love you." His nostrils flared, and he looked suddenly proud. "I could work. You would not be poor. I would help you." "Sounds like a marriage," I said, trying to lighten the atmosphere. But my voice was too shaky. "Yes," he said.”

“Look, how come he showed up now? When you have other fairies in the woods? And does that sound crazy when you say it out loud, or what?”