"Patience, grasshopper," I counseled. "You don't want to seem overeager." "Right, that's why I said tomorrow," he said. "I want to see you again tonight. But I'm willing to wait all night and much of tomorrow." I rolled my eyes. "I'm serious," he said."You don't even know me," I said. I grabbed the book from the center console. "How about I call you when I finish this?""But you don't even have my phone number," he said."I strongly suspect you wrote it in this book."He broke out into that goofy smile. "And you say we don't know each other."

I believe humans have souls, and I believe in the conservation of souls.

Grief doesn't change you. It reveals you.

And as paralyzing and upsetting as all the never agains were, the final leaving felt perfect. Pure. The most distilled possible form of liberation.

A novel is a conversation between a reader and a writer.

Because there is no glory in illness. There is no meaning to it. There is no honor in dying of.

Because no one can catch the motherfucking fox.