The trick was looking past the illusion, because the exit was never as far away as it seemed.

The sullen boy sitting before me is not my husband, and the girl he is fretting over isn't me, will never be me.

We accept gods that don't speak to us. We accept gods that would place us in a world filled with injustices and do nothing as we struggle. It's easier than accepting that there's nothing out there at all, and that, in our darkest moments, we are truly alone.

Bet you never eat, he says. Bet you drink up the oxygen like it's butter. Bet you can go for days on nothing but thoughts.

Forget who you are and what you think is there, and you'll discover things that don't exist to be known.

Set fire to the broken pieces; start anew.

I nod like I'm not at all unnerved by this new cold side to him. Not cruel like his father. Not warm like the husband who sought me out on quiet nights. Something in between. This Linden has never woven his fingers through mine, never chosen me from a line of weary Gathered girls, never said he loved me in a myriad of coloured lights. We are nothing to each other.