Indiana,’ he said. ‘They steal the land from the Indians and leave the name, yes?

I wanted to know that he would be okay if I died. I wanted to not be a grenade, to not be a malevolent force in the lives of people I loved.

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

Study broadly and without fear.

I knew that time would now pass for me differently than it would for him - that I, like everyone in that room, would go on accumulating loves and losses while he would not. And for me, that was the final and truly unbearable tragedy: Like all the innumerable dead, he'd once and for all been demoted from haunted to haunter.

Look, let me just say it: He was hot. A nonhot boy stares at you relentlessly and it is, at best, awkward and, at worst, a form of assault. But a hot boy . . . well.

Every year, many, many stupid people graduate from college. And if they can do it, so can you.