Like Christ, I had become intimately acquainted with violence and the sins of the world, but I had not come away unblemished. Violence felt like holiness to me now. Perhaps I had given something away the night I had first tasted your blood, and now the place inside me where God used to dwell was empty. I hoped not, on that night of all nights. I needed divine strength in my veins. I needed some sense of worth beyond your hard-won approval of me.
