This is how sudden things happened that haunted forever.

Pine trees with low limbs spread over fresh snow made a stronger vault for the spirit than pews and pulpits ever could.

Ree, brunette and sixteen, with milk skin and abrupt green eyes, stood bare-armed in a fluttering yellowed dress, face to the wind, her cheeks reddening as if smacked and smacked again.

Gail had a baby named Ned who was four months old, and a new look of baffled hurt, a left-behind sadness, like she saw that the great world kept spinning onward and away while she'd overnight become glued to her spot.

Never. Never ask for what ought to be offered.

I said shut up once already, with my mouth.

The heart's in it then, spinning dreams, and torment is on the way. The heart makes dreams seem like ideas.