I close my eyes. An image flashes—emerging from the van with Julian after our escape from New York City; believing, in that moment, that we had escaped the worst, that life would begin again for us. Instead life has only grown harder.

Old words; words that nearly brought me to my knees. Live free or die

And there it is: Even though we’re standing in the same patch of sun-drenched pavement, we might as well be a hundred thousand miles apart.

I wonder whether she was sorry for leaving us behind.

Sometimes I'm afraid to go to sleep because of what I'm leaving behind.

I feel a flash of grief so intense it almost makes me cry out: not for what I lost, but for the chances I missed.

Sometimes I think maybe they were right all along, the people on the other side in Zombieland. Maybe it would be better if we didn't love. If we didn't lose either. If we didn't get our hearts stomped on, shattered: if we didn't have to patch and repatch until we're like Frankenstein monsters, all sewn together and bound up by who knows what. If we could just float along, like snow. But how could anyone who's ever seen a summer - big explosions of green and skies lit up electric with splashy sunsets, a riot of flowers and wind that smells like honey - pick the snow?