“I swallowed hard, a hot flush blazing a trail across my skin. Reminded me of that old television show, Bonanza. You know, the one with the burning map and the lively western tune? Yeah, my skin was that map, but the song blaring in my head leaned more toward a “bow-chick-a-wow-wow” sound than anything else. Hormone overload!”

“I drew it over my skin like a violins bow, No one would ever hear the song of my shame.”

“My body was heading into a flare. I paced a bit, tried to remember how to breathe right, how to calm my skin. But it blared at me. Sometimes my scars have a mind of their own.”

“I live in my house as I live inside my skin: I know more beautiful, more ample, more sturdy and more picturesque skins: but it would seem to me unnatural to exchange them for mine.”

“It was as though I had one map inside my head and it led to the man who was waiting for me. Someone who was alone — maybe even more alone — than I was…”

“A burning map. Every epic, my friend Jack used to say, should start with a burning map. Like in the movies. Fucking flames burning the world away; that's the best thing about all those old films, he said -- when you see this old parchment map just ... getting darker and darker in the centre, crisping, crinkling until suddenly it just ... fwoom.”