Have you ever been homesick for someplace that doesn't actually exist anymore? Someplace that exists only in your mind?

Like books, the Internet has saved my life. It helped me recognize that so many people I adore suffer from the same things I do.

Meanwhile, I was doodling pictures of vampiric cougars.

That night I looked up at those same stars, but I didn't want any of those things. I didn't want Egypt, or France, or far-flung destinations. I just wanted to go back to my life from my childhood, just to visit it, and touch it, and to convince myself that yes, it had been real.

A friend is someone who knows where all your bodies are buried. Because they're the ones who helped you put them there." And sometimes, if you're really lucky, they help you dig them back up.

I picked up the phone to call the police, but then I considered how it would sound when I told them that I was calling from inside my bathroom, where I’d OD’ed on laxatives, and that a possible rapist was quietly passing me notes under the bathroom door.

Every time I get scared or feel like I'm not going to be good enough at something, I say that mantra to myself. "Pretend you're good at it."