Tibby cried into her soup when it finally came. "I'm scared... ," she told it. The carrots and peas made no reply, but she felt better for having told them.

The happiness at getting what you want is not usually commensurate with the worry leading up to it.

She existed in her friends; there she was. All the parts of herself she'd forgotten. She knew herself best when she was with them.

He'd pushed her. He'd scared her. He'd besieged her. He'd vowed he wouldn't, and he did.

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

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.

There are moments in your life when the big pieces slide and shift. Sometimes the big changes dong happen gradually but all at once. That's how it was for us. That was the day we discovered that friends can do things for you that your parents can't.