“But in the time between when something gets thought and when it gets done, the ball hit me square across the side of the face. I fell, the back of my head slamming against the gym floor. I then stood up immediately, as if unhurt, and left the gym.Pride had gotten me off the floor of the gym, but as soon as I was outside, I sat down."I am concussed," I announced, entirely sure of my self-diagnosis.”

“I don't know whether it was the general anxiety of being on a date (albeit one with my would-be date sitting fivepeople away from me) or the specific anxiety of having the Beast stare in my direction, but for some reason, I tookoff running after Takumi. I thought we were in the clear as we began to round the corner of the bleachers, butthen I saw, out of the corner of my eye, a cylindrical orange object getting bigger and bigger, like a fastapproachingsun.I thought: / think that is going to hit me.I thought: J should duck.But in the time between when something gets thought and when it gets done, the ball hit me square across theside of the face. I fell, the back of my head slamming against the gym floor. I then stood up immediately, as ifunhurt, and left the gym.Pride had gotten me off the floor of the gym, but as soon as I was outside, I sat down."I am concussed," I announced, entirely sure of my self-diagnosis."You're fine," Takumi said as he jogged back toward me. "Let's get out of here before we're killed.""I'm sorry," I said. "But I can't get up. I have suffered a mild concussion."Lara ran out and sat down next to me."Are you okay?""I am concussed," I said.Takumi sat down with me and looked me in the eye. "Do you know what happened to you?""The Beast got me.""Do you know where you are?""I'm on a triple-and-a-half date.""You're fine," Takumi said. "Let's go."And then I leaned forward and threw up onto Lara's pants.”

“I am concussed," I announced, entirely sure of my self-diagnosis.”

“I called it a nine because I was saving my ten. And here it was, the great and terrible ten, slamming me again and again as I lay still and alone in my bed staring at the ceiling, the waves tossing me against the rocks then pulling me back out to sea so they could launch me again into the jagged face of the cliff, leaving me floating face up on the water, undrowned.”

“He walked over to Isaac and grabbed him by the shoulders. “Dude, pillows don’t break. Try something that breaks.”Isaac reached for a basketball trophy from the shelf above the bed and then held it over his head as if waiting for permission.“Yes,” Augustus said. “Yes!” The trophy smashed against the floor, the plastic basketball player’s arm splintering off, still grasping its ball. Isaac stomped on the trophy.“Yes!” Augustus said. “Get it!” And then back to me, “I’ve been looking for a way to tell my father that I actually sort of hate basketball, and I think we’ve found it.”

“When you go into the ER, one of the first things they ask you to do is rate your pain on a scale of one to ten, and from there they decide which drugs to use and how quickly to use them. I'd been asked this question hundreds of times over the years, and I remember once early on when I couldn't get my breath and it felt like my chest was on fire, flames licking the inside of my ribs fighting for a way to burn out of my body, my parents took me to the ER. nurse asked me about the pain, and I couldn't even speak, so I held up nine fingers.Later, after they'd given me something, the nurse came in and she was kind of stroking my head while she took my blood pressure and said, "You know how I know you're a fighter? You called a ten a nine."But that wasn't quite right. I called it a nine because I was saving my ten. And here it was, the great and terrible ten, slamming me again and again as I lay still and alone in my bed staring at the ceiling, the waves tossing me against the rocks then pulling me back out to sea so they could launch me again into the jagged face of the cliff, leaving me floating faceup on the water, undrowned.”

“I felt tired for the first time, and I thought of us lying down on some grassy patch of SeaWorld together, me on my back and she on her side with her arm draped against me, her head on my shoulder, facing me. Not doing anything—just lying there together beneath the sky, the night here so well lit that it drowns out the stars. And maybe I could feel her breathe against my neck, and maybe we could just stay there until morning and then the people would walk past us as they came into the park, and they would see us and think that we were tourists, too, and we could just disappear into them.”