She liked that word: we. It sounded warm and open, like a hug.

You should only fall in love with people who will fall in love with you back.

That was what her parents did not understand—and had never understood—about stories. Liza told herself storied as though she was weaving and knotting an endless rope. Then, no matter how dark or terrible the pit she found herself in, she could pull herself out, inch by inch and hand over hand, on the long rope of stories.

Love. I love you. I’ll always love you, my love. You are the love of my life.

I want to be healed and whole and perfect again, like a misshapen slab of iron that comes out of the fire glowing, glittering, razor-sharp.

My heart shoots into my throat every time I think I see his loping walk, or catch sight of some floppy brown hair on a boy - but it's never him, and each time it isn't, my heart does a reverse trajectory down into the very pit of my stomach.

I put my forehead on his collarbone, place one hand on his chest. Its rhythm reassures me: He is real, and he is now.