When we're alive, life consumes us. But when we die, all of the color and the motion is gone so quickly, it's as though it can no longer stand to be wasted on us.

He says one word, nodding into the daylight. "Look." It's an astounding word. It's a gift.

Vaughn is talking about the heat, and his voice is so excited that it breaks into whispers at times. He loves his madness the way a bird loves the sky.

Fall has always been my favorite season. The time when everything bursts with its last beauty, as if nature had been saving up all year for the grand finale.

I used to have only one name; it used to mean something.

Because even if the lie is beautiful, the truth is what you face in the end.

Times like this, when she slips her hand into mine and holds on tight, and our husband becomes just a shadow in the doorway.