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What is a person, if not the marks they leave behind? She has learned to step between the thorny weeds, but there are some cuts that cannot be avoided—a memory, a photograph, a name.
But she prays the way her father turns loaves of bread upright, the way her mother licks her thumb to collect stray flakes of salt. As a matter of habit, more automatic than faith.
“A dreamer,” scorns her mother. “A dreamer,” mourns her father. “A dreamer,” warns Estele. Still, it does not seem such a bad word. Until Adeline wakes up.
There is a rhythm to moving through the world alone. You discover what you can and cannot live without, the simple necessities and small joys that define a life. Not food, not shelter, not the basic things a body needs—those are, for her, a luxury—but the things that keep you sane. That bring you joy. That make life bearable.
Stories are a way to preserve one’s self. To be remembered. And to forget. Stories come in so many forms: in charcoal, and in song, in paintings, poems, films. And books. Books, she has found, are a way to live a thousand lives—or to find strength in a very long one.
Adeline was going to be a tree, and instead, people have come brandishing an ax. They have given her away.
Being forgotten, she thinks, is a bit like going mad. You begin to wonder what is real, if you are real. After all, how can a thing be real if it cannot be remembered? It’s like that Zen koan, the one about the tree falling in the woods. If no one heard it, did it happen? If a person cannot leave a mark, do they exist?
“Small places make for small lives. And some people are fine with that. They like knowing where to put their feet. But if you only walk in other people’s steps, you cannot make your own way. You cannot leave a mark.”
“But that’s the thing, Henry, you haven’t been you. You waste so much time on people who don’t deserve you. People who don’t know you, because you don’t let them know you.” Bea cups his face, that strange shimmer in her eyes. “Henry, you’re smart, and kind, and infuriating. You hate olives and people who talk during movies. You love milkshakes and people who can laugh until they cry. You think it’s a crime to turn ahead to the end of a book. When you’re angry you get quiet, and when you’re sad you get loud, and you hum when you’re happy.” “And?” “And I haven’t heard you hum in years.” Her
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You are whoever they want you to be. You are more than enough, because you are not real. You are perfect, because you don’t exist. (Not you.) (Never you.) They look at you and see whatever they want … Because they don’t see you at all.
“I’m sorry I missed it.” “That’s the great thing about birthdays,” she said, leaning against him. “They happen every year.”
That time always ends a second before you’re ready. That life is the minutes you want minus one.
Ok. like yeah. leave me alone?
“Do you know how you live three hundred years?” she says. And when he asks how, she smiles. “The same way you live one. A second at a time.”
“You don’t love him.” A sad smile crosses her face. “I’ve had my share of love,”
Because the girl he loved is gone. And he’s still here. He remembers everything.
Belief is a bit like gravity. Enough people believe a thing, and it becomes as solid and real as the ground beneath your feet. But when you’re the only one holding on to an idea, a memory, a girl, it’s hard to keep it from floating away.
