People adapt. People change. You can grow where you're planted.

Embarrassment felt a lot like eating chili peppers. It burned in the back of your throat and there was nothing you could do to make it go away. You just had to take it, suffer from it, until it eased off.

It was like the way you wanted sunshine on Saturdays, or pancakes for breakfast. They just made you feel good.

It felt as though they were the only people in the world, two young women about to bury the symbol of their helplessness, as if that's all it would take to make them whole again.

It looked like the world was covered in a cobbler crust of brown sugar and cinnamon.

To this day she could make tap water boil just by kissing him.

But that would leave Paxton to fend for herself, and the last thing any woman wanted in this kind of situation was to look around and see all the people who could help her doing nothing.