The true story...is the realization that no time in your life is ever perfect, that even the best memories have cracks you might not see.

You punched him by accident.

No," I snapped. "I mean, no. I'm answering. I'm just collecting my response." Another few seconds passed. Is there a time limit for this?" he asked. I shot him a look. "Just wondering.

Okay," he said. He took a breath. "What would you do, if you could do anything?" I took a step toward him, closing the space between us. "This." I said. And then I kissed him.

This was always the problem with my mother and me, I suddenly realized. There were so many things we thought we agreed on, but anythign can have two meanings. Like sides of a coin, it just matters how it falls.

I find that the more I depend on real life, the less interesting the story is. It's much more common for me to take something that almost-happened, or I wish had happened, and then follow that possibility.

I was heading off to my new world. But I was taking a part of my past, and the future, along with me for the ride.