“Pain was my tie to a past that a part of me wanted to hold on to. The more I hurt, the more I knew I loved, and that felt like a good thing.”

“I wanted him to hold me, to take care of me. To make the pain dissolve away. I know that this was part of what had ruined everything but I wanted it once more anyway.”

“She leaned into me, and when I closed my eyes, I knew I wanted nothing more than to hold her this way forever.”

“Thinking about Caleb hurts, but trying to move beyond my love for him, hurts more. There's no getting past the pain. There is only a different brand of pain available for my eager consumption.”

“It hurts more than anything in the world because even though it might not be the case, it feels like you've chosen your child over me.'I haven't there is no choice. She's part of me. You're part of me too. It's like...I don't know...asking me to pick between my heart and my lungs.''I know, but the thing is, you are my heart and my lungs. You're everything to me. And what hurts is that I know i used to be everything to you.”

“There was a lot of pain in that kiss. There was so much hurt and so much fear in it. I felt tears rolling down the both of our faces. But, in that kiss, there was even more want. We both wanted to smother out that pain, to not have so many horrible things in the all too recent past, to just be normal, to do the types of things we were supposed to be dealing with besides death and disability.”