Every second of your definitionally temporary consciousness, you are choosing how you spend something that will not last forever.

I can't remember, because I never knew.

I pointed at the little kids goading each other to jump from rib cage to shoulder and Gus answered just loud enough for me to hear over the din, 'Last time, I imagined myself as the kid. This time, the skeleton.

I just want to fly under the radar, because when you start to make yourself into a big deal, that's when you get shot down.

It was psychological trick called empathic listening. You say what the person is feeling so they feel understood.

Thank you," I say, pounding his back probably too hard. "That was the best damned passenger-seat driving I've ever seen in my life." He pats my uninjured cheek with his greasy hand. "I did it to save myself, not you," he says. "Believe me when I say that you did not once cross my mind. " I laugh. "Nor you mine," I say.

I tried--I swear I tried. But you didn't want to hear what I was saying, and I used that as an excuse to let it go on.