At the end of every line she’d poke him in his ribs with a ruler and shout, “Breathe!” until he couldn’t imagine making any other choice. For the third time that week, she sacrificed one of her darlings to his future, pinning a light blue rosebud to his carefully pressed uniform jacket and saying, “There. It matches your eyes.” Looking sharp, with a belly full of oatmeal and a rib cage dotted with bruises reminding him to inhale, he set off for the Academy.
