How could you not want to draw breath one more day? How could your own life be such a cheap commodity? But then I started to understand: when your existence is hell, death must be heaven.

I know that there will be other women, but they couldn't compare. Maybe I'll change, maybe love will change, but I think we were a once-in-a-lifetime. You could never leave me; that's why I am not more upset. You can't possibly break these feelings. They stretch, and they last.

We are all, I suppose, beholden to our parents - the question is, how much?

If it is possible to die of grief then why on earth can't someone be healed by happiness?

I used to think I'd be just like them when I grew up, but I am not. And the thing is, somewhere along the way, I stopped wanting to be like them, anyway.

Grief is a curious thing, when it happens unexpectedly. It is a Band-aid being ripped away, taking the top layer off a family. And the underbelly of a household is never pretty, ours no exception.

I have only known her for two years. But if you took every memory, every moment, if you stretched them end to end-they'd reach forever.