Cassie

“I've known a lot of whores in my life," added Gore, [...]. "Both men and women. And in general, I've always found them to be good company, with a highly evolved sense of honor. A whore will never cheat you, they have too much integrity for that. But you, Mr. Swift, you give the profession a bad name.”
― John Boyne, A Ladder to the Sky

“One day soon, you’ll hear a car pull up to your curb, an engine cut out. You’ll hear footsteps coming up your front walk. Like they did for Edward Wayne Edwards, twenty-nine years after he killed Timothy Hack and Kelly Drew, in Sullivan, Wisconsin. Like they did for Kenneth Lee Hicks, thirty years after he killed Lori Billingsley, in Aloha, Oregon.

The doorbell rings.

No side gates are left open. You’re long past leaping over a fence. Take one of your hyper, gulping breaths. Clench your teeth. Inch timidly toward the insistent bell.

This is how it ends for you.

“You’ll be silent forever, and I’ll be gone in the dark,” you threatened a victim once.

Open the door. Show us your face.

Walk into the light.”
― Michelle McNamara, I'll Be Gone in the Dark: One Woman's Obsessive Search for the Golden State Killer

“He threads a hook, re-sews his mouth, cuts off the thread-tails with the razor blade. It's a simple task, no more difficult than shaving. He can do it in the dark. He can do it in a thirty-knot wind and seven-foot seas. He can do it in his sleep, and he probably has.
(Margin note in reference to excerpt above:) "Per Dr. B: it's easy to get used to doing things that are harmful to ourselves- do it often enough + it becomes ordinary/habitual- just how you live.”
― Doug Dorst, S.

“You’re a storyteller. Dream up something wild and improbable," she pleaded. "Something beautiful and full of monsters."

“Beautiful and full of monsters?"

“All the best stories are.”
― Laini Taylor, Strange the Dreamer