It's true that there is a rescue thing in people, and not just rescuing the family, which is kind of obvious from a biological point of view. But why is it that some people will jump into a freezing river and swim out to a downed plane for total strangers? What is that about? And it seems to be that it's part of your concept of who you are. That's why some people run into the burning buildings, because if they don't, their concept of who they are will be violated. They wouldn't be who they thought they were.

How furious she must be, now that she's been taken at her word.

A home filled with nothing but yourself. It's heavy, that lightness. It's crushing, that emptiness.

Neither of us says the word love, not once. It would be tempting fate; it would be romance, bad luck.

Soon it will be daybreak. Soon the day will break. I can't stop it from breaking in the same way it always does, and then from lying there broken; always the same day, which comes around again like clockwork. It begins with the day before the day before, and then the day before, and then it's the day itself. A Saturday. The breaking day. The day the butcher comes.

Come away with me, he said, we will live on a desert island. I said, I am a desert island. It was not what he had in mind.

Little girls are cute and small only to adults. To one another they are not cute. They are life-sized.