House of Glass

by Sarah Pekkanen

People who endure childhoods like mine tend to go one of two ways, a therapist once told me. Either they try to give their kids the kind of parenting they wish they’d had, or they avoid children altogether.

Does anyone like working at a place for minimum wage where they get burn marks from the grill and always smell like fried onions?

Infidelities often begin with a slow blurring of boundaries, until crossing the final one doesn’t seem as momentous.

I’ve heard this before from people who have been unfaithful. They don’t cheat because they’re wildly attracted to someone else. They do it because someone else made them feel attractive.

“Often, what we see in art is a reflection of us. Of our optics. Our mindset. Have you ever tried to read a novel and not enjoyed it, then gone back at another point in time and loved it? The story didn’t change. But you did. This is an insight into who we are at any given moment and what we bring to our unique intersection with art.”

The only bad thing about dogs is that they leave us much too soon.

You can’t protect yourself against loss, Stella. It’s part of living a full life.

The things we try to bury are often the things that need the most sunlight.

“Grief can consume us, so it’s a natural protective mechanism to get distracted by other things. Just because you sometimes feel happy or angry or you don’t think about Tina as often doesn’t mean you are dishonoring her memory. It means you’re trying to survive.”

“I understand you haven’t felt ready for the information before now. But carrying this around your whole life has weighed on you in ways you can’t even imagine. Knowing the truth might not make it easier. But it may free you.”

for all of the losses life has dealt us both, it balanced the scales a bit when it gave us each other.

I read once that we humans are wired to create patterns, even unhealthy ones. The dynamics we learn at a young age, when our brains are the most malleable, are the same ones we seek out as adults. Predictability feels more necessary to us than positive change.

“Lust makes men careless. They think we women are foolish; that we’re so busy tending to the home and children we don’t notice they’re suddenly all jittery and possessive about their phones.”

“Is evil a natural force in some people, or is it created by man?”

“I believe evil is a natural force, like a hungry virus, perpetually swirling through the air and seeking places to infiltrate. Most of us bar the door against it.” Sam walks back to his chair and sits again. “Others welcome it in.”

Fury is more menacing when it glides beneath a seemingly placid surface. People who can control their rage, spiraling it out and yanking it back like a whip, are far more unsettling to me than someone who erupts in the heat of the moment.

when wrath is a choice, and the mind works in sync with the body’s physiology, calculating and planning when and where to unleash it? It’s utterly terrifying.

Lies gather force when the stakes rise.

Everyone fibs—by pretending to remember someone’s name, or to get out of a dinner invitation—but those untruths are rooted in a desire to spare another’s feelings or avoid an awkward moment. They’re white lies. Generally harmless. Here in DC, lies are as ubiquitous as pollen in the spring air. They’re spread to undermine someone in power, or to elevate one’s own prospects. Sometimes the lies are debunked. Other times they’re so ingrained in the public consciousness they might as well be truth.

The most determined liar of all is someone who is fighting for their life. They’ll say anyt...

“He did the wrong things for the right reasons. Most important, his heart was always in the right place.”

“The thing is, people like us—we want to go back in time and change things for ourselves. We can’t. But when we help other people … well, it doesn’t fix us. But for a little while, every time I close a case and I’ve gotten some justice for a victim, I get this feeling of—” “Peace.” “Exactly.”

“Remember that time in my office when I told you I like puzzles?” I nod; her proximity takes my breath away. She leans a few inches closer and kisses me lightly. Her lips taste of whisky and feel like a promise. “You’re a puzzle,” she whispers.