He wanted to pay her; he thought women ought to be paid for keeping men from dying or going out of their minds.

The woman is the home. That's where she used to be, and that's where she still is. You might ask me, What if a man tries to be part of the home -- will the woman let him? I answer yes. Because the he becomes one of the children.

Banality is sometimes striking.

Very early in my life it was too late.

I'm still there, watching those possessed children, as far away from the mystery now as I was then. I've never written, though I thought I wrote, never loved, though I thought I loved, never done anything but wait outside the closed door.

What she said was always strange. It had happened long ago. It seemed insignificant. And yet it was something you remembered forever. The words as well as the story. The voice as much as the words.

When you wept it was just over yourself and not because of the marvelous impossibility of reaching her through the difference that separates you.