Dear Alice, you've disappeared, like everything else. But who else can I talk to? …I'm lost, Alice. When you left -- and he left -- you took everything with you. But the absence of him is everywhere I look.

Time passes. Even when it seems impossible. Even when each tick of the second hand aches like the pulse of blood behind a bruise. It passes unevenly, in strange lurches and dragging lulls, but pass it does. Even for me.

''you put on a good show. But I'd be willing to bet that you're suffering more than you let anyone see''