When the worst happens and you still survive, it sets you free from fear.

It's the grit that makes the pearl.

Maybe that's why he watched over all of us--because of the ones he couldn't protect, he took care of the ones he could.

Ask no questions, I tell no lies.

If pregnant girls were sinner, what were liars called?

Under the bridge, traffic above us and coats around us, hearts thudding with the steady perfection of this moment, I thought of every word I had never before dared to think about him.Future. Hope.And love, as the rain slowed to a misty trickle through the long and beautiful night.

I started to sway Lexi again when I realized she was quiet. Waiting. Both of us paused on the cusp of the unknown. I couldn't go backward or even retrace my own steps, let alone Xanda's. I could only go forward. The threads of time weren't unraveling but weaving into a tapestry -- a future, and a hope. The only way to discover was to step into it.

I thought of Shelley in the hospital, how she said sometimes sadness only looked like anger and judgment. Maybe fear did too.

We're all family--the only family we've got. It doesn't have to be blood.

At home, they'd clipped my wings and then caged me so I couldn't fall. Here, they bandaged one another's broken wings, helped each other fly.