“As her lungs pumped and her head cleared, she wondered if all the effort she’d put into blotting out the pain had deadened her ability to feel pleasure, too. What a shame. What a loss.”

“Her skin is slowly peeled from her body. She knows something low and guttural must be coming out of her mouth, She can feel it ripping its way out of her lungs and past her throat. But she can't hear it because there is a roar in her veins like a hurricane. A bright, pure light pierces her, fixes her on a single point of space and time, and she is screaming still, though not from pain, but from fear and wonder. Like she's just been born.”

“It seems to me that the difficult thing in life is to find what stirs you and move toward it. Mom put us first but also put us in the way of whatever moved her and, so, avoided the anxiety of the unknown, the fear of failure, the pain of opening up her heart and feeling her losses. Her selflessness was also her selfishness.”

“O-90 sat over the notebook, her head leaning toward her left shoulder, and making such an effort that her tongue was pushing her left cheek out. She looked like such a child, so charming. And so I felt good all over, clear, simple...”

“All this time she’d thought it God’s will that she be a spinster. She had grown content with that expectation, taking satisfaction in the wisdom she’d gained through her experience with Stephen. No man would dupe her again. But what if living alone was never part of God’s plan for her? What if she chose that life because it was safe—because she was afraid?”

“She parked near the fence and took a deep breath. Curious, she did itagain, feeling her lungs expand, then contract. She sat in silence,letting her body decide what to do next. Her lungs stayed still, but shedidn't feel as though she was suffocating.“Yep, dead,” she whispered.”