“Beautiful men and women with distorted shadows came and scorched their handprints onto doors before vanishing skyward, drafts of heat billowing behind them with the whumph of unseen wings. Here and there, feathers fell, and they were like tufts of white fire, disintegrating to ash as soon as they touched the ground.”

“When I think of Simone now, I think of butterfly wings. Beautiful and excruciatingly delicate. Touch them once and they might disintegrate.”

“Feather to fire,fire to bloodBlood to bone,bone to marrowMarrow to ashes,ashes to snow”

“Snowflakes of ash fell so lovelily you were tempted to stretch out your tongue to catch them, taste them. Only, they would have scorched your lips. They would have cooked your mouth.”

“Driggs whispered to Lex out of the side of his mouth as they walked, "I never got grounded before you came here.""You never touched a boob before I came here either.""Touché." He flashed a goofy grin as Uncle Mort shoved him into his room and slammed the door. "Worth it!”

“As far as I knew white women were never lonely, except in books. White men adored them, Black men desired them and Black women worked for them.”