Darkness, real darkness, was more than just a lack of light.

The beginning of a book is always the hardest part for me. I'm a Chapter 3 kind of writer, which means I naturally start at Chapter 3.

There are no coincidences.

I pulled Lena's necklace out of my pocket. I let the charms roll around in my palm, but they were tangled and meaningless without her. The necklace was heavier than I imagined, or maybe it was the weight of my conscience.

The ways I could hurt her and hurt myself. Those two things were intertwined somehow. It's hard to explain, but when you were as closed off as I was the past few months, opening felt as wrong as stripping naked in church.

I guess that’s the thing about a hero’s journey. You might not start out a hero, and you might not even come back that way. But you change, which is the same as everything changing. The journey changes you, whether or not you know it, and whether or not you want it to.

Who burns me and shocks me and shatters me with a single touch.