"The light was warm and pink... it was like seeing everything through a fond memory."

"It [love] doesn't work like that," she said, "and I was hoping she would tell me how it did work.

Maybe she could see that, because she went on.

"Sometimes you're loved because of your weaknesses," she said. "What you can't do is sometimes more compelling than what you can."

For a second, I felt hope for myself. But loving for weaknesses seemed like a weakness itself."

-The Girls' Guide to Hunting and Fishing

"He lit cigarettes for both of us and lay back. He was quiet, so I was; he was thinking, so I did.

We lay there in the dark.

I said, "What?"

He didn't answer for a long time, so long I thought he wouldn't. Then, finally, he said, "Everything."

Even now, remembering the sound of his voice chastens every word I say.

___________________________________________

We quit.

We drank fruit juice. We did breathing exercises.

When he wanted a cigarette, he took a nap. I wept."