I'm so very grateful to the readers who put down their hard-earned money to read what I write. They don't have to do that. They choose to. And I try and earn that trust every time I put out a book. I know that sometimes the stories head into challenging territory and I respect that that can be hard. It's a wonderful journey, though, and I'm so glad we're all on it together!

But looking at this closet, so nice and arranged with their crazy lives at rest among these carefully placed clothes and footwear, she felt good about where they were. "Normal" was not a bad things in this lunatic world; it really was. No matter how it happened to be defined.

Blay said yet again, that old, familiar voice cutting through all of those years of rejection and judgment, giving him not just a rope of acceptance to hang on to, but a flesh-and-blood hand to lead him out of the darkness of his past... And into a future that didn't require lies or excuses, because what he was, and what they were, was both extraordinary-and not hing out of the ordinary. Love, after all, was universal.

...the only thing that had tethered her to the earth had been him and it was strange, but she felt welded to him on some core level now. He had seen her at her absolute worst, at her weakest and most insane, and he hadn't looked away. He hadn't judged and he hadn't been burned. It was as if in the heat of her meltdown they had melted together. This was more than emotion. It was a matter of soul.

When she didn't continue, he shrugged. "Just let me bring you coffee. I want to wait on you. Makes me happy

If you're going to insist on being reasonable, I'm going to stop hanging with you.

Falling into ruin was a bit like falling in love: Both descents stripped you bare and left you as you were at your core. And both endings are equally painful.