Look Closer

by David Ellis

I will sometimes forget my sister’s birthday. I will never forget the day she died.

They have to learn to fight for themselves.

the best lies are the ones closest to the truth.

Running through this neighborhood reminds me that some people have bigger things to worry about than whether they get promoted to a stupid full professorship at their school. Some people are fighting for a decent life.

Only the nicknames you hate stick.

Simon says I’m just scared, like any future parent would be. Yes, I’m scared. I’m scared I’ll wreck them. I’m scared they’ll turn out like me. What could I teach them? What kind of role model would I be? What if I had them and realized I couldn’t handle it after it’s too late?

Simon has often joked that he has Irish Alzheimer’s—he only remembers the slights, the grudges.

We are so unwilling to give up this notion that we control things and people around us that we’d rather feel guilt over the suicide than admit that we didn’t have that control in the first place.”

I have become the man I despise.

Not heal. But move on. Move on but remember.

I mean, I try to be reasonable. But sometimes, I let things bother me more than they should.

The secret life of Lauren Betancourt keeps getting odder and odder.”

But that’s what you do with the people you love. You trust them. You trust them until they prove you wrong. Until they betray you.