“Long shadows of evening creep up the walls, inching closer. Gradually, they reach fully across us, holding us in the stillness that only night can bring. In the hazy gloom of dusk, we are silhouettes of ourselves, reduced to our very essence. The night grows bolder. Unafraid, it opens its mouth and swallows us whole.”

“I can't help feeling humiliated for Ithal. He stands at the wall and watches us go, and when we reach the turnoff for the school, he's still there with the mangled flower in his hands, far behind us a small, dying star fading out of our constellation.”

“In our travels, we have come across many equations--math for understanding the universe, for making music, for mapping stars, and also for tipping, which is important. Here is our favorite equation: Us plus Them equals All of Us. It is very simple math. Try it sometime. You probably won’t even need a pencil.”

“Around us the night creatures have their say. We are surrounded by a symphony of crickets and frogs. Neither of us feels the need to speak, and I suppose that is one of the qualities I find comforting in Kartik. We can be alone together.”

“But the past cannot be changed, and we carry our choices with us, forward, into the unknown. We can only move on.”

“Books are, at their heart, dangerous. Yes, dangerous. Because they challenge us: our prejudices, our blind spots. They open us to new ideas, new ways of seeing. They make us hurt in all the right ways. They can push down the barricades of ‘them’ & widen the circle of ‘us.”

“Our mouths and bodies speak for us in a new language as the trees shake loose a rain of petals that stick to our slickness like skins we will wear forever. And just like that, I am changed.”