If you can’t get out of bed for long enough, people come and take your bed away.
People don’t make good Anchors, though, Craig. They change.
I wasn’t gifted. Mom was wrong. I was just smart and I worked hard. I had fooled myself into thinking that was something important to the rest of the world. Other people were complicit in this ruse. Nobody had told me I was common.
I like how you don’t hide your problems like everyone else, and I don’t have to hide mine when I’m around you.
It’s a huge thing, this Shift, just as big as I imagined. My brain doesn’t want to think anymore; all of a sudden it wants to do.
If there is a next life, I hope it’s in the past; I don’t think the future will be any more handleable. I think it’s a little harsh how the END button is red.
Dad nods, looks me dead in the eyes; slowly and regretfully, he banishes all the smiling and joking from his face, and for once he’s just my dad, watching his son who has fallen so low.
I want to live but I want to die. What do I do?
They’re sort of ancillary anyway, friends. I mean, they’re important – everybody knows that; the TV tells you so – but they come and go. You lose one friend, you pick up another.
I’m not afraid of dying, I’m afraid of living.
And when you say the truth you get stronger.
But some people have to get lucky just to live. And I never knew I could make anybody lucky.
I had hurt her feelings, I found out later; I didn’t know I had that power.
I owe her everything and I love her and I tell her these days, although every time I say it, it gets a little diluted. I think you run out of I love yous.
I’m still a nobody, when am I not going to be a nobody?
You shouldn’t be able to be alive and you are. You want to trade?
There are better versions of me, Jeremy. It’s not like with people. With people you can argue and have tests and music reviews and wars to decide who’s better, but with software, it’s pretty clear. I get evolved beyond my version number, and then I’m useless.
What’s a triumph is that you woke up this morning and decided to live. That’s a triumph.
I click END. I think it’s a little harsh how the END button is red.
I raise my wrist, show him the bracelets. I have pride in them now. They’re true, and people can’t screw with them. And when you say the truth you get stronger.