"A learning: deep shit sweetens your plans like crazy."

"I hear Taylor's song through the 'Tss, tss, tss' of a guy's earphones, a couple of rows up. 'Better Man' is the tune,…"

"She gets that fabulous edge that girls get to their voices, the edge that spells oncoming Tantrum From the Bowels of …"

"A learning grows in me like a tumor. It's about the way different needy people find the quickest route to get some at…"

"Fate always pays attention to what you think, then slams it up your fucken ass."

"There's the learning, O Partner: that you're cursed when you realize true things, because then you can't act with the…"

"I stand insulated from my world by the buzzing tequila-ozone of what I just did. Lies scatter around me like ants."

"Nah, my slime's so thick, it ain't worth coming clean at all. Take good note; Fate actually makes it harder to admit …"

"I take off my shirt. My skin is mostly healed now, from my art project. Tattooed in big blue letters across my chest …"

"The official ushers me to a desk, and sits behind it, all straight-backed, like he's the president of South America o…"