“If we have to be cat burglars, I'm going to see what' to steal in the fridge."We're trying to find evidence she's the poisoner. Just a thought before you start putting random things in your mouth." Ruth shrugged and walked past Val.”

“Great. Lookout. I'm a lookout. Another thing to put on my college applications. What do I do if I see someone?"Val looked back. "I'm not sure, actually.”

“We got it." Val grinned and lifted her fist. "Wonder twin powers activate!" Ruth grinned back, knocking her fist into Val's. "Shape of two fucking lunatics.”

“Stop thinking," he said.I have to think," said val. "You said I was supposed to concentrate."Thinking makes you slow. You need to move as I move. Right now, you're merely following my lead."How can I know where you're going to go before you've gone there? That's stupid."It's no different from knowing where an opponent might move. How do you know where a ball is likely to go on the lacrosse field?"The only things you know about lacrosse are the things I told you," Val said.I might say the same about you and sword fighting." He stopped. "There. You did it. You were so busy snapping at me that you didn't notice you were doing it."Val frowned, too annoyed to be pleased, but too pleased to say anything more.”

“People said that video games were bad because they made you numb to death, made you register entrails splattering across a screen as a sign of success. In that moment, Val thought that the real problem with games was that the player was suppossed to try everything. If there was a cave, you went in it. If there was a mysterious stranger, you talked to him. If there was a map, you followed it. But in games, you had a hundred million billion lives and Val only had this one.”

“I have to spring a cat out of Rumelt Animal Shelter. Think of it as a prison break." It does the trick. He laughs. "Whose cat?" "My cat. What do you think? That I break out the cats of strangers?" "Let me guess, she was framed. She's innocent.”

“I'm afraid that whatever I touch is spoilt by the contact.""I'm not scared of being spoiled," Val said.”