The Storyteller

by Jodi Picoult

Death walked next to me as I trudged down the street, whispered into my ear as I washed my face, embraced me as I shivered in bed.

There is a magic to intimacy, a world built of sighs and skin that is thicker than brick, stronger than iron. There is only you, and him, so impossibly close that nothing can come between. Not the enemy, not your allies. In this safe haven, in this hallowed place and time, I could even ask the questions whose answers I feared.

History isn’t about dates and places and wars. It’s about the people who fill the spaces between them.

forgiving isn’t something you do for someone else. It’s something you do for yourself. It’s saying, You’re not important enough to have a stranglehold on me. It’s saying, You don’t get to trap me in the past. I am worthy of a future.”