Maybe what frightens us about the edge isn't our fear of morality, but the thoughts it leads us to have.

Home?' I say. It's a word that can mean anywhere and nowhere.

There's a world out there that nobody has bothered to promise her.

And everywhere girls, tumbling from trees like orange blossoms and hitting the earth with sickening thuds. They crack open.

When I was 11 or 12, I was really bored with everything on my summer reading list. It was all happy, middle-grade kinds of books. I was getting frustrated, because I liked to read. My mother went to the library and got me a copy of 'The Other Side of Midnight' by Sidney Sheldon. It was my first adult book.

Tell me about yourself." "Myself?" He looks confused. "Yes," I say, patting the mattress. "You know all there is to know," he says, sitting beside me. "Not true," I say. "Where were you born? What's your favourite season? Anything." "Here. Florida," he says. "I remember a woman in a red dress with curly brown hair. Maybe she was my mother, I'm not sure. And summer. What about you?" The last part is said with a smile. He smiles so infrequently that I consider each one a trophy.

Linden just wants to protect her, is what I want to say. She's all he has. I left him. I'm at arms reach, but I've left him.