“I just stare at him. I want to ask him a thousand questions, but I can tell he doesn't want to be asked. "We make weird friends," I say instead."I've never been into the f-word with people.""I'm privileged, then? Why me?"He thinks for a moment and shrugs again."You're the realest person I've ever known.""Is that good or bad?""It's fucking awful. There's not much room for bullshit, and you know how I thrive on it."We laugh for a moment and begin walking again.”

“Cricket tells a joke and turns to see if I'm laughing, if I think he's funny, and I want him to know that I do think he's funny, and I want him to know that I'm glad he's my friend, and I want him to know that he has the biggest heart of anyone I've ever known. And I want to press my palm against his chest to feel it beat, to prove he's really here.”

“How was your day?” he asked. I faltered, unaccustomed to the question. The look on my face must have been strange because he laughed at me and said, “Okay… don’t tell me then.”Considering the question I asked, “Do people normally want a real answer to that?”I’d only been asked for reports by my father or his team.Julian thought for a moment and shrugged, “I suppose not. Most people say ‘good’ or ‘fine’ even when they don’t mean it.”He mistook my question for simple speculation instead of a lack of understanding. Nodding I snickered and said, “Then it was fine. Yours?”He grinned, “Good.”

“Well," I said finally, knowing he was waiting, "you make me laugh."He nodded. "And?""You're pretty good-looking.""Pretty good-looking? I called you beautiful.""You want to be beautiful?" I asked him."Are you saying I'm not?”

“I've been burdened by questions I've asked myself a thousand times since the last time we were together. Why did I do it? And would I do it again?It was I, you see, who ended it.”

“Man," he said, "I'm not afraid of graveyards. The dead are just, you know, people who wanted the same things you and I want.""What do we want?" I asked blurrily."Aw, man, you know," he said. "We just want, well, the same things these people wanted.""What was that?"He shrugged. "To live, I guess," he said.”