“The thing is, you don't get to know. It's not like you wake up with a bad feeling in your stomach. You don't see shadows where there shouldn't be any. You don't remember to tell your parents you love them or--in my case--remember to say good-bye to them at all.”

“I remember I once saw this old movie...; in it the main character was talking about how sad it is that the last time you have sex you don't know it's the last time. Since I've never even had a first time, I'm not exactly an expert, but I'm guessing it's like that for most things in life--the last kiss, the last laugh, the last cup of coffee, the last sunset, the last time you jump through a sprinkler or eat an ice-cream cone, or stick your tongue out to catch a snowflake. You just don't know.But I think that's a good thing, really, because if you did know it would be almost impossible to let go. When you do know, it's like being asked to step off the edge of a cliff: all you want to do is get down on your hands and knees and kiss the solid ground, smell it, hold on to it.”

“Don't you get it? You can't tell me what to feel.”

“Don't you get that yet? You don't know shit about me, I don't know shit about you. You don't even know shit about you.”

“We're on the other side of the fence now, Lena,' she says, tiredly, as she passes. "Don't you get it? You can't tell me what to feel.”

“I learned to tell stories from my mom. "Your dad's not feeling well today," she'd say. I had an accident. She'd say, Remember what happened. You're a clumsy girl. You walk into a door. You tripped and stumbled down a staircase. My favorite story: He doesn't mean to.She was so good at telling stories that I started to believe them after a while. Maybe I was clumsy. Maybe it was my fault for provoking him.Maybe he didn't really mean to.”

“I do know you.” I’m still crying, swallowing back spasms in my throat,struggling to breathe. This is a nightmare and I will wake up. This is amonster-story, and he has come back to me a terror-creation, patched together,broken and hateful, and I will wake up and he will be here, andwhole, and mine again. I find his hands, lace my fingers through his evenas he tries to pull away. “It’s me, Alex. Lena. Your Lena. Remember? Remember37 Brooks, and the blanket we used to keep in the backyard—”“Don’t,” he says. His voice breaks on the word.“And I always beat you in Scrabble,” I say. I have to keep talking, andkeep him here, and make him remember. “Because you always let me win.And remember how we had a picnic one time, and the only thing we couldfind from the store was canned spaghetti and some green beans? And yousaid to mix them—”“Don’t.”“And we did, and it wasn’t bad. We ate the whole stupid can, we were sohungry. And when it started to get dark you pointed to the sky, and told me there was a star for every thing you loved about me.”