I don't know what's wrong with me. It's like all I can do is keep writing this gibberish to keep from breaking apart.

It's strange to describe reading a book as a really great experience, but that's kind of how it felt.

When I was done reading the poem, everyone was quiet. A very sad quiet. But the amazing thing was that it wasn’t a bad sad at all. It was just something that made everyone look around at each other and know that they were there. Sam and Patrick looked at me. And I looked at them. And I think they knew. Not anything specific really. They just knew. And I think that’s all you can ever ask from a friend.

As we all know, when you're an athlete things are a little bit easier for you. It didn't mean that what was going on inside my heart wasn't a bit of a thunderstorm, but outwardly I got along ok. I was really shy in seventh grade.

Part of the reason I wrote the book was I wanted to understand for myself why such good people let themselves get treated so badly.

Maybe it's good to put things in perspective, but sometimes, I think that the only perspective is to really be there.

And later that night to be with my family at dinnertime and have things just be like they always were. That was the amazing part. Things just keep going. We didn't talk about anything heavy or light. We were just there together. And that was enough.