I am fed up. I am fed up with tears and weakness. But there isn't much I can do to stop them.

Choices can be made again." -Evelyn Johnson (Eaton)

I was still afraid of him, I knew, but in a different way - I was no longer a child, afraid of the threat my terrifying father posed to my safety. I was a man, afraid of the threat he posed to my character, to my future, to my identity.

The battle we are fighting is not against a particular group. It is against human nature - or at least what it has become.

That is death - shifting from "is" to "was.

Instead I just let the silence stretch out between us. It's the only adequate response to what he just told me, the only that does the tragedy any justice instead of patching it hastily and moving on.

There are men with guns up there. When they see me, they will kill me, if they can," I tell my father quietly. I search his eyes. "Should I let them?" He stares at me for a few seconds. "Go," he says, "and God help you.