I didn't know whether to trust Alaska, and I'd certainly had enough of her unpredictability - cold one day, sweet the next; irresistibly flirty one moment, resistibly obnoxious the next. I preferred the Colonel: At least when he was cranky, he had a reason.

So I wasn't lying, exactly. I was just choosing among truths.

But it is the nature of stars to cross, and never was Shakespeare more wrong than when he has Cassius note, ‘The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars / But in ourselves.

A small olive-skinned creature who had hit puberty but never hit it very hard, Ben had been my best friend since fifth grade, when we both finally owned up to the fact that neither of us was likely to attract anyone else as a best friend.

We only have so long to play in the dirt and ask questions of rivers.

We gotta do something about this frigging swing set,' he said. 'I'm telling you, it's ninety percent of the problem.

So keeping the box closed just keeps you in the dark, not the universe.