The Life Cycle of the Common Octopus

by Emma Knight

He lifted his eyes to hers. “I asked you to come because I liked you,” he said. His voice was serious. It was not a voice of persuasion. “I’ve liked you from the beginning. Your intensity and complete lack of artifice. The way you look at people like you can see into their souls.

Not everyone would be suited to the life I chose. But I chose it freely; it’s mine. Getting to choose for oneself is a gift so vanishingly rare that one must never squander it.”