I’m not suggesting the world is good, that life is easy, or that any of us are entitled to better. But please, isn’t this the kind of thing you talk about in somber tones, in the afternoon, with some degree of hope and maybe even a handful of strategies?

He could build a city. Has a certain capacity. There’s a niche in his chest where a heart would fit perfectly and he thinks if he could just maneuver one into place – well then, game over.

I wouldn’t kill your pony. I’d like to believe it, anyway. I’d like to believe I wouldn’t drag you out in to the woods and leave you there, either. So far, it hasn’t come up.

Who am I? I'm just a writer. I write things down. I walk through your dreams and invent the future. Sure, I sink the boat of love, but that comes later. And yes, I swallow glass, but that comes later.

This is my favorite part. It starts and ends here. The pebbles shine, the plan worked, Hansel Triumphant. Lesson number one: be sneaky and have a plan. But the stupid boy goes back, makes the rest of the story postscript and aftermath. He shouldn’t have gone back. And this is the second lesson I took from the story: when someone is trying to ditch you, kill you, never go back.

Tell me how all this, and love too, will ruin us. These, our bodies, possessed by light. Tell me we'll never get used to it.

Fairy tales have rules. You are a princess or you aren’t. You are pure at heart or you aren’t. If you are pure at heart, or lucky, you might catch a break.