Watching him, I thought, not for the first time that night, that maybe it should have felt strange to be with him, here, now. And yet it didn’t, at all. That was one of the things about the night. Stuff that would be weird in the bright light of day just wasn’t so much once you passed a certain hour. It was like the dark just evened it all out somehow.

I always tried to imagine what it would be like to open your door to find something you had given up on. Maybe it had seen places you never had, been rerouted and passed through so many strange hands, but still somehow found its way back to you, all before the day even began.

Look at it this way: I might be saying you're fat, but at least I'm not punching you in the face.' Are those the only options?' Not always. Just sometimes.

Hey, think fast!' I just looked at Fave as he chucked the basketball at me with possibly the worst overhand throw I'd ever seen. It landed to my far right, then bounced past me, banging against my dad's truck. 'Do you have a vision problem of something?' I asked him. 'Just keeping you on your toes,' he replied

It was so weird, because usually I was totally nervous talking to guys. But Eli was different. He made me want to say more, not less. Which was maybe not a good thing.

I sat up, sliding them off, and the quiet around me did not, for once, seem empty and vast. Instead, for the first time in a while, it felt like it already was full.

Sometimes a question can hurt more than an answer.