#indexingedit

I chose to take that as a good sign—that’s me, ever the optimist—and I held to it as I reached deep down into myself, finding the place where the snow never melted and where a man’s death could smell like apples. I didn’t close my eyes, but it still felt like I was opening them when I came back out of the cold, trailing the memory of it with me.

“This world is unforgiving and cruel to those it judges as even the slightest bit outside the norm. If anyone should be kind, understanding, accepting, loving to their fellow outcasts, it’s you. All of you. You are the guardians of the secrets of the universe, beloved of worlds that most will never dream of, much less see … can’t you see where you owe it to yourselves to be kind? To care for one another? No one outside this room will ever understand what you’ve been through the way the people around you right now understand.”