“And what does that signify to you?" he said, perhaps forgetting that if she could speak truly to the world, she would not be a mental patient.”

“The only language she could speak was grief. How could he not know that? Instead, she said, "I love you." She did. She loved him. But even that didn't feel like anything anymore.”

“Occasionally she glanced at him, asking with her glance, 'Is this what I think?' "I understand,' she said, blushing. "What is this word?' he said, pointing to the "n' that signified the word "never." .... She wrote: t, I, c,g,n,o,a.”

“I've caused you pain, and I'm sorry for it,' she said. 'But perhaps that pain will keep you from forgetting me.”

“She wanted Kristen to do all the horrible things she said she would do to her and to have her physical pain from Kristen’s hate replace her mental pain from her father’s love. Pain that comes from the outside was much easier to endure. The wounds heal, the scars go away, and it’s over. She could move on. She would live on and forget her pain. The wounds caused by her father, that festered inside Simone’s heart, mind, and blood would never heal. She would never be able to just move on and forget the scars.”

“He would never know know her. Such intimacy but no communication, because words - even if she could speak or write them - could never explain her world to him.”