“And I put my hand on her arm to stop her rowing.Aaron’s Noise roars up in red and black.The current takes us on.“I’m sorry!” I cry as the river takes us away, my words ragged things torn from me, my chest pulled so tight I can’t barely breathe. “I’m sorry, Manchee!”“Todd?” he barks, confused and scared and watching me leave him behind. “Todd?”“Manchee!” I scream.Aaron brings his free hand towards my dog.“MANCHEE!”“Todd?”And Aaron wrenches his arms and there’s a CRACK and a scream and a cut-off yelp that tears my heart in two forever and forever.And the pain is too much it’s too much it’s too much and my hands are on my head and I’m rearing back and my mouth is open in a never-ending wordless wail of all the blackness that’s inside of me.”

“And the pain is too much it's too much it's too much and my hands are on my head and I'm rearing back and my mouth is open in a never-ending wordless wail of all the blackness that's inside me.And i fall back into it.”

“Manchee comes outta the bushes and sits down next to me cuz I’ve stopped right there in the middle of a trail. He looks around to see what I might be seeing and then he says, ”Good poo, Todd.” ”I’m sure it was, Manchee.”I’d better not get another ruddy dog when my birthday comes. What I want this year is a hunting knife like the one Ben carries on the back of his belt. Now that’s a present for a man.“Poo,” Manchee’s says quietly.”

“Todd!” she says again but this time in a way that asks me to look at her and I do and she stops Angharrad at the edge of the square and she’s looking at me, looking right into my eyes–And I read her–And I know exactly what she’s thinking–And my Noise and my heart and my head fill up fit to burst, fill up like I’m gonna explode–Cuz she’s saying–She’s saying with her eyes and her face and her whole self–“I know,” I say back to her, my voice husky. “Me, too.”And then I turn to the Mayor and I’m filled with her, with her love for me and my love for her–And it makes me big as an effing mountain–And I take it and I slam all of it into the Mayor–”

“TODD!" I yell again and I reach him and his Noise opens even farther and wraps around me like a blanket and I'm grabbing him to me, grabbing him to me like I'll never let him go and he calls out in pain but his other arm is grabbing me back - "I thought you were dead," he's saying, his breath on my neck. "I thought you were dead.""Todd," I say and I'm crying and the only thing I can say is his name. "Todd.”

“Oh  .  .  . wow  .  .  . I don’t know what to say. I want to thank  .  .  .” His voice broke and the tears in my eyes rolled down my cheeks. Bringing the back of his hand to his mouth, Kellan stopped talking. Shaking his head again, he slowly lowered his hand. “I’m sorry.” His voice warbled with barely contained emotion. “My wife just told me she’s pregnant.”