“Lord, help us root our feet to the earthAnd our eyes to the roadAnd always remember the fallen angelsWho, attempting to soar,Were seared instead by the sun and, wings melting,Came crashing back to the sea.Lord, help root my eyes to the earthAnd stay my eyes to the roadSo I may never stumble.-Psalm 24 (From "Prayer and Study," The Book of Shhh)”

“His eyes are the color of honey. These are the eyes I remember from my dreams.”

“I start to follow her, and Alex grabs my hand."I'll find you," he says, watching me with the eyes I remember. "I won't let you go again."I don't trust myself to speak. Instead I nod, hoping that he understands me. He squeezes my hand."Go," he says.”

“I close my eyes. An image flashes—emerging from the van with Julian after our escape from New York City; believing, in that moment, that we had escaped the worst, that life would begin again for us.Instead life has only grown harder.”

“It is as though he has just recognized me. Then his eyes continue to sweep, and my heart comes hammering back to my ribs. I'm just being paranoid.”

“Behind us the door creaks open, and I turn around, expecting Raven, just as a voice cuts through the air: “Don’t believe her.”The whole world closes around me, like an eyelid: For a moment, everything goes dark.I am falling. My ears are full of rushing; I have been sucked into a tunnel, a place of pressure and chaos. My head is about to explode.He looks different. He is much thinner, and a scar runs from his eyebrow all the way down to his jaw. On his neck, just behind his left ear, a smalltattooed number curves around the three-pronged scar that fooled me, for so long, into believing he was cured. His eyes—once a sweet, melted brown,like syrup—have hardened. Now they are stony, impenetrable.Only his hair is the same: that auburn crown, like leaves in autumn.Impossible. I close my eyes and reopen them: the boy from a dream, from a different lifetime. A boy brought back from the dead.Alex.”

“Promise me we'll stay together, okay?" His eyes are once again the clear blue of a perfectly transparent pool. They are eyes to swim in, to float in, forever. "You and me.""I promise," I say.Behind us the door creaks open, and I turn around, expecting Raven, just as a voice cuts through the air: "Don't believe her.”