This was not a place you go to live. It was a place you go to die."- Paper Towns

I have never really thought of him as a person, either.... A guy whose strings were broken, who didn’t feel the root of his leaves of grass connected to the field, a guy who was cracked. Like me.

He'd fought hard, Lida told me, as if there was another way to fight.

The Colonel's hand was so little, and I grabbed it tight, his cold seeping into me and my warmth into him. 'I memorized the populations,' he said.

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

He told me this while ripping through his duffel bag, throwing clothes into drawers with reckless abandon. Chip did not believe in having a sock drawer or a T-shirt drawer. He believed that all drawers were created equal and filled each with whatever fit. My mother would have died.

I kept it for myself like a keepsake, as if sharing the memory might lead to its dissipation.