Things would get difficult again. But that was okay too. The bravery was in moving forward, no matter what.

Everything looks stark and vivid and frozen, as though drawn precisely and outlined in ink - parents' smiles frozen, camera flashes blinding, mouths open and white teeth glinstening, dark glossy hair and deep blue sky and unrelenting light, everyone drowning in light - everything so clear and perfect I'm sure it must already be a memory, or a dream.

I don't love you, Lena. Do you hear me? I never love you.

I feel like I'm playing some giant video game, or trying to solve a really complicated math equation. 'One girl is trying to avoid forty raiding parties of between fifteen to twenty people each, spread out across a radius of seven miles. If she has to make it 2.7 miles through the center, what is the probablitiy she will wake up tomorrow morning in a jail cell? Please feel free to round pi to 3.14'.

But this isn’t like anything I’ve ever seen, or imagined, or even dreamed: This is like music or dancing but better than both.

If you’re smart, you care. And if you care, you love.

But how could anyone who's ever seen a summer - big explosion of green and skies lit up electric with splashy sunsets, a riot of flowers and wind that smells like honey - pick the snow?