Pet the cat dude," says Sam. "She brought you a present. She wants you to tell her how badass she is." "You are a tiny tiny killing machine." Daneca coos. "What's she doing?" I ask. "Purring!" says Daneca. She sounds delighted. "Good kitty. Who's an amazing killing machine? That's right. You are! You are a brutal brutal tiny lion! Yes, you are.

Love changes us, but we change how we love too.

She loves the serene brutality of the ocean, loves the electric power she felt with each breath of wet, briny air.

Mine. The language of love is like that, possessive. That should be the first warning that it's not going to encourage anyone's betterment.

Memory is slippery. It bends to our understanding of the world, twists to accommodate our prejudices. It is unreliable. Witnesses seldom remember the same things. They identify the wrong people. They give us the details of events that never happened. Memory is slippery, but my memories suddenly feel slipperier.

It makes you a different person, to not have a past. It eats away at who you are, until what’s left is all construct, all artifice.

If you keep it," Daneca says, "he'll have his claws in you." Everyone has their claws in me. Everyone.