Because if it weren’t for me, Lena and Alex would never have been caught at all. I told on them. I was jealous.

Of all the systems of the body - neurological, cognitive, special, sensory - the cardiological system is the most sensitive and easily disturbed. The role of society must be to shelter these systems from infection and decay, or else the future of the human race is at stake. Like a summer fruit that is protected from insect invasion, bruising, and rot by the whole mechanism of modern farming; so must we protect the heart.

It's surprisingly nice out here, peaceful and pretty-strange to be standing in the middle of a little garden while enclosed by the massive stone walls of the prison, like being at the exact center of a hurricane, and finding peace and silence in the middle of so much shrieking damage.

My heart is fluid and soaring. There's no longer any space between heartbeats.

I've been so used to thinking of what the borders are keeping out that I haven't considered that they're also penning us in.

Grief is like sinking, like being buried.

How can someone have the power to shatter you to dust--and also to make you feel so whole?