When I walk away, I know I won’t have the strength to knock again.
Because like I said before, I’ve never said goodbye to anyone that I knew I would never see again.
And I will never see them again.
I only have a little over a week left.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Present,June 1987
Toby
The following week is dark.
Darker than normal.
When I’m not at school, I’m in my room.
Alone.
Light off.
No drawing.
No comics.
And when I am at school, I watch Alice.
From afar.
I ache to be near her.
But I avoid her.
Even when she comes to apartment 3A and knocks on the door, I don’t answer.
Which is hard.
So hard.
Because I’m the moth.
And she’s the flame.
Everything about her is ethereal.
She is light.
And hope.
And beauty.
Fearlessness embodied.
I am none of those.
I am her corruptive antidote.
