“There are a hundred things she has tried to chase away, the things she won’t remember and that she can’t even let herself think about because that’s when the birds scream and the worms crawl, and somewhere in her mind it’s always raining a slow and endless drizzle.
You will hear that she has left the country, that there was a gift she wanted you to have, but it is lost before it reaches you. Late one night the telephone will sing, and a voice that might be hers will say something that you cannot interpret before the connection crackles and is broken.
Several years later, from a taxi, you will see someone in a doorway who looks like her, but she will be gone by the time you persuade the driver to stop. You will never see her again.
Whenever it rains you will think of her.”
(“Strange” segment of Strange Little Girls by Neil Gaiman)
“She is not waiting. Not quite. It is more that the years mean nothing to her anymore, that the dreams and the street cannot touch her.
She remains on the edges of time, implacable, unhurt, beyond, and one day you will open your eyes and see her; and after that, the dark.
It is not a reaping. Instead, she will pluck you, gently, like a feather, or a flower for her hair.”
(“Time” segment of Strange Little Girls by Neil Gaiman)
“She doesn’t know who owned the jacket originally. Nobody claimed it after a party, and she figured it looked good on her.
It says KISS, and she does not like to kiss. People, men and women, have told her that she is beautiful, and she has no idea what they mean. When she looks in the mirror she does not see beauty looking back at her. Only her face.
She does not read, watch TV, or make love. She listens to music. She goes places with her friends. She rides roller coasters but never screams when they plummet or twist and plunge upside down.
If you told her the jacket was yours she’d just shrug and give it back to you. It’s not like she cares, not one way or the other.”
(“Rattlesnake” segment of Strange Little Girls by Neil Gaiman)
“She seems so cool, so focused, so quiet, yet her eyes remain fixed upon the horizon.
You think you know all there is to know about her immediately upon meeting her, but everything you think you know is wrong. Passion flows through her like a river of blood.
She only looked away for a moment, and the mask slipped, and you fell. All your tomorrows start here.”
(“New Age” segment of Strange Little Girls by Neil Gaiman)
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