A muffled curse comes from the doorway. I jerk my head to find Jeb there, blood drained from his face. His gaze is fierce yet dejected, a deep and gut-twisting wound I haven’t seen since his dad was alive and tormenting him.

— A.G. Howard

And there, in the midst of blinding orange, yellow, and white flames, our forever begins.

— A.G. Howard

An old childhood playmate once told me ‘second guessing every step prevents any forward momentum. Trust yourself. Forgive yourself. And move on.

— A.G. Howard

Another thread snaps loose from my heart, the pain precise and acute. I embrace it, because it reminds me I'm still here. I'm alive. Furthermore, I'm empowered.

— A.G. Howard

Before I can even ask what he means, he skims his licorice-scented lips across my forehead—just shy of touching—his warm breath dragging across my left eye patch, then down a cheek, toward my mouth. The corner of my mouth tickles as he passes over it; then his breath stops to hover across my chin. His palms rest against the wall on either side of my head. He lets the web serve as his hands, his breath serves as his lips, holding me immobile and kissing me without ever touching me.

— A.G. Howard

Behind every wall and every mirror and every vent, I hear sounds: breathing, rustling, footsteps, and murmurs. I try to tell myself it’s just mice making their nests behind the barriers, but since when do rodents whisper?

— A.G. Howard

But I do, and the barbed wire tightens once more, until my heart is strangled and broken.

— A.G. Howard

Guard your throats and hide your eyes. He’s not dead, you fools. Legends never die.

— A.G. Howard

He appears close to my age. The left half of his face stands out beneath the hood: one side of plump lips, one squared angle of a chin. Two coppery-colored eyes look back at me – bright and metallic. The sight makes me do a double take. As far as he is from the car, I shouldn’t be able to make out the color, yet they glimmer in the shadow of his cape, like pennies catching a flashlight’s glare in a deep well.

— A.G. Howard

He’d walked as a ghost in the gloomy bowels of this opera house for so long, darkness had become his brother, which was fitting, since his father was the night, and sunlight their forgotten friend.

— A.G. Howard