Every third step I ran, my breath exploded out of me all in a rush. One step to suck in another cold lungful. One step to let it excape. One step of not breathing.

Mother and daughter like spoons in a drawer.

sensitive," I tried. Sam translated, "squishy." "creative." "Dangerously Emo." "thoughtful." Feng shui.

He'd only been gone two seconds, but the room got brighter when they were together, as if they were two elements that became brilliant in proximity. At Sam's clumsy efforts to carry the vacuum, Grace smiled a new smile that I thought only he ever got, and he shot her a withering look full of the sort of subtext you could only get from a lot of conversations whispered after dark. It made me think of Isabel, back at her house. We didn't have what Sam and Grace had. We weren't even close to having it. I didn't think what we had could get to this, even if you gave it a thousand years.

Sam,' the girl said. 'Sam.' She was the past present and future. I wanted to answer , but I was broken.

It wasn’t a touch that said I need more. It was a touch that said I want this.

Grace (talking about Sam): At the sight of him, my stomach slid down to my feet, a weird combination of relief, nerves, and anticipation all in one, a feeling that never seemed to go away.