you remember what is lost, and you forget what's right in front of you.

She wondered again about her inclination to wish for things that made her so deeply unhappy.

As the three of them walked home from the trees, nobody needed to say it, but Ama knew. They had questioned their friendship. They had searched and wondered, looking for a sign. And all along they'd had their trees. You couldn't wear them. You couldn't pass them around. They offered no fashion advantage. But they had roots. They lived.

They were here all at once, but not together. Survival took self-absorption, and it made them strangers with nothing to do and no way to relate. Emergencies gave you a shape and a plot to take part in, while death was no story at all. It left you nothing.

I'm not going anywhere without you. We're swimming to China together. And if the worst happens, I'm dying with you before I'm living without you.

You are not going to die, I know I said I'd let you, but I can't.

Show me a girl with her feet planted firmly on the ground and I'll show you a girl who can't put her pants on. -Annik Marchand