I want to drag you off and hide you away,” he whispered. “Why?” “I always knew you were beautiful, but now everyone else will too. I won’t be able to keep other boys away from you, and it’ll make me crazy.

I'll always want him. Until every sun goes dark in every sky, until I am nothing more than long-forgotten cosmic dust, I will want him. And even then I suspect my particles will long for his.

He would bear scars because of me, as I carried them for him.

They say funerals are not for the dead but for the living. Those rites are what permit you to move on, so if you don't deal with the remains, you can never deal with the memories. That might be true; we may have walked in their dust down on Venice Minor, but it's not the same as a proper good-bye.

If you don't tell me what's on your mind, I can't guess

I’m sick of asking questions everyone else already knows the answers to.

In the enclave, the strong and the physically perfect survived, but if you were strong, you protected the weak until they had an opportunity to grow into their own power.