have to assume that one night, when the stars were gleaming overhead, she met a devil on the road like so many of my friends did, and he offered her a spread of cards, flipping them between his pale fingers. Alcoholism, born-again reverence, madness, a quiet cottage, a noisy car wreck, a lonely house on the edge of the desert, a book she could use as a tomb, a single line etched in the boardwalk, they would have flickered by, and taking a deep breath, she would have closed her eyes and chosen.
Beautiful
