I need to know that wherever I end up, in the stars or in the gutter, you’re along for the ride.

I was having an epiphany. A moment of supreme clarity, leading to what I dubbed a “realization of solitude” that goes like this: I’m lonely. But when I left that girl in the window I was sure I’d never felt more godforsaken in my life. There’s a big difference between being alone and being lonely. And I’m guessing that once you’ve discovered this distinction you can’t go back to solitary confinement without serious emotional repercussions.

We’re all searching for something to fill up what I like to call that big, God-shaped hole in our souls. Some people use alcohol, or sex, or their children, or food, or money, or music, or heroin. A lot of people even use the concept of God itself. I could go on and on. I used to know a girl who used shoes. She had over two-hundred pairs. But it’s all the same thing, really. People, for some stupid reason, think they can escape their sorrows.

Forget the noose. Forget the Iron Maiden. Forget the electric chair or the guillotine. The mind was mankind's most painful torture chamber, the blessed liberty to cogitate offering either doom or salvation, depending on one's disposition.

In his eyes I saw all the other possibilities. The dream-world possibilities. The fairytale possibilities. The seemingly impossible possibilities.

I would have remembered the good stuff. Nobody ever remembers the good stuff.

That's why you have to save the dying man. Because you want him around to keep saving you.