“He told me about his slow realization that when one person in a family was sick, the whole family was sick. In Jason's case, the sick person was his father, who was nice enough when he was sober, but mean as a snake when he was drunk.”

“Yeah," he replied, his voice scratchy and raw as he stared at Will. "I am sick. Sick of lying, sick of being afraid, sick of pretending the person I love most in the world isn't standing right in front of me." He slipped his fingers into Will's and before the other man could register what was happening, Scott pulled him up hard against his body and kissed him, deep and tender. When he pulled back, he stared into Will's astonished eyes.”

“When the man who feeds the world by toiling in the fields is himself deprived of the basic rights of feeding, sheltering, and caring for his own family, the whole community of man is sick.”

“A man who knows how little he knows is well, a man who knows how much he knows is sick. If, when you see the symptoms, you can tell, Your cure is quick.A sound man knows that sickness makes him sick and before he catches it his cure is quick.”

“When I got better I realized what a rat he was, but then I had to understand the impossible complexity of his life, how he had to leave me there, sick, to get on with his wives and woes.”

“Blessed is the servant who loves his brother as much when he is sick and useless as when he is well and an be of service to him. And blessed is he who loves his brother as well when he is afar off as when he is by his side, and who would say nothing behind his back he might not, in love, say before his face.”