Kate, I want you to know that I awoke the first time I saw you.

I spent the rest of my day in someone else’s story. The rare moments that I put the book down, my own pain returned in burning stabs. I felt like a circus knife thrower’s target. If I held my mind immobile, I might avoid being hit by the blades whizzing by my head. From time to time I fell asleep, but was immediately awakened by the dark, tortured dreams that, once I awoke, dissolved without a trace.

Lucky man,“Jules said to me, leaning over to kiss my cheeks. “What I wouldn’t give to be in your head.” Instead of the usual quick air-kisses, he took his time kissing both of my cheeks tenderly. “Jules!” I gasped, feeling myself blush. He stood, looking up in space, and raised both arms as if in surrender. “Okay, okay, man. Hands off, I get it! But it’s not often we get a young pretty human in the house. in fact, it’s never.

I was now in slasher-film mode.

The only way I survive is to never stop moving. I make sure I’m always surrounded by others, so I won’t have time to think and end up imploding like a dying star.

Vincent to Kate: “The day I stop seeing you as one of the strongest people I know is the day I wake up human.

I went to the only thing that I know it’ll make me feel good. To another woman’s arms.

I’m not always the best at expressing myself to you, so I’m taking advantage of the fact that I will be completely unresponsive when you read this, and therefore incapable of messing things up.

Kate, I’ll say it like this. Vincent is my best friend. There’s not a person in this world I’m closer to. But for the past year, I have betrayed him in my heart every single day because I want for myself what he loves the very most.

My home is not a place. It’s not a fixed location on the map; not Paris or New York. It is with Ava. Wherever she is – that is where I belong.