And my life went to pieces, like a love letter in the rain.

They were contemplating moving into another house or, more exactly, loudly saying to each other, so as to be overheard by anyone who might be listening, that they were contemplating moving, when all at once the fiend was gone, as happens with the moskovett, that bitter blast, that colossus of cold air that blows on our eastern shores throughout March, and then one morning you hear the birds, and the flags hang flaccid, and the outlines of the world are again in place.

Above the front door the fanlight glowed blue, delicate as wing-bones.

Lugh's decided to stick with bein mad at me. It's like traveling with a storm cloud. One of them that hangs low an heavy. The kind that builds an broods an keeps on buildin an brood in till everybody's got a sick headache.

I am so stupid, so easily fooled. It's really almost funny. If I could lift a finger I would gladly kill myself.

Disappear, she says. I love that word.