It occurs to me that for a long time she has been doing her own version of resisting.

That's when you realize that most of it-life, the relentless mechanism of existing-isn't about you. It doesn't include you at all. It will thrust onward even after you've jumped the edge. Even after you're dead.

Do the other kids make fun of you? For how you talk?' 'Sometimes.' 'So why don't you do something about it? You could learn to talk differently, you know.' But this is my voice. How would you be able to tell when I was talking?

This is what hatred is. It will feed you and at the same time turn you to rot.

Each step is more difficult than the last; the heaviness fills me and turns my limbs to stone. You must hurt or be hurt.

I didn’t know it would be like this,” he says in a whisper. And then: “I’m scared.

There is only what you want and what happens. There is only grabbing on and holding tight in the darkness.