“And I wasn't convinced that it was a good idea, sort of like asking for advice on how to catch a baseball in your teeth or pick all the cheese off your cheeseburger.”

“This idea is fraught with peril, and I fear that my answers to your questions will be interpreted as approval rather than reluctant assistance.”

“From her dubious tone alone, I could see how Karin had no idea how terrifying words spoken quietly could be. How words chosen precisely to wreak maximum damage ticked like a bomb in your head, but exploded in your heart hours later, leaving you scarred and changed.”

“Do you still want to be a farmer?' Mom asked.I shook my head.'Then study hard. You can choose your future, your sisters and brother can't. You're lucky. If they had blisters like yours, they would still have to be there till the last stem was harvested. It's their life.”

“Hey, if it's a good philosophy, it works. Death is imminent. Live every day like it's your last.”

“The pressure of his touch through my jacket and my sweater was more assurance than any promise ever made to me. It was a touch that said, I have your back and I am here for you. If a girl wasn't careful, she could fall in love with a touch like that.”

“But the truly brilliant geocachers?""Yeah?" he says. "What about us?""They know it by its real name. Terra Firma.""Terra Firma," he repeats. At last, he slips his backpack off his shoulder. I know what he's looking for.I take a breath. "You don't need your GPS for this cache."His eyes don't move off mine; he's watching me so carefully. "You don't, huh?""Nope," I say.Some things are meant to be kept - what you learn from experiences good or bad, smiles from an orphaned girl, a boy who is your compass pointing to your True North. So I look at Jacob full in the face with nothing obscuring him. Or me. And then I step closer to him. And closer. And closer yet."Here I am," I tell him. "Here I am.”