“Now and Laters. Starbust, Pixie Stix. If she gets too bitchy, just feed her this crap. As long as the sugar high is in effect, you and the wildlife should be safe”

“There’s a piece of lead where my heart should beatDoctor said too dangerous to take outYou’d better just leave it beBody grew back around it, a miracle, praise beNow, if only I could get through airport security“bullet”

“There are like twenty people in that waiting room right now. Some of them are related to you. Some of them are not. But we're all your family.'"She stops now. Leans over me so that the wisps of her hair tickle my face. She kisses me on the forehead. 'You still have a family,' she whispers.”

“But I'd do it again. I know that now. I'd make that promise a thousand times over and lose her a thousand times over to have heard her play last night or to see her in the morning sunlight. Or even without that. Just to know that she's somewhere out there. Alive.”

“I do have a point to all this,” she continues. “There are like twenty people in that waiting room right now. Some of them are related to you. Some of them are not. But we’re all your family.” She stops now. Leans over me so that the wisps of her hair tickle my face. She kisses me on the forehead. “You still have a family,” she whispers.”

“I get it now. I have to make good on my promise. To let her go. To really let her go. To let us both go.”

“She didn't care that people called her a bitch. 'It's just another word for feminist,' she told me with pride.”