You Are Truly Satan's Sequined Spawn.

With Each Shimmy, The Bugle Beads On Their Scandalously Revealing Costumes Swung And Shook. It Was The Sort Of Display Evie Knew Her Mother Would Have Found Appalling—an Example Of The Moral Decay Of The Young Generation. It Was Sexual And Dangerous And Thrilling, And Evie Wanted More Of It.

Just Once, She'd Like To Be The Exciting One, The Girl Somebody Wanted.

But What Was The Point Of Living So Quietly You Made No Noise At All?

As A Kid, I Imagined Lots Of Different Scenarios For My Life. I Would Be An Astronaut. Maybe A Cartoonist. A Famous Explorer Or Rock Star. Never Once Did I See Myself Standing Under The Window Of A House Belonging To Some Druggie Named Carbine, Waiting For His Yard Gnome To Steal His Stash So I Could Get A Cab Back To A Cheap Motel Where My Friend, A Neurotic, Death-obsessed Dwarf, Was Waiting For Me So We Could Get On The Road To An Undefined Place And A Mysterious Dr. X, Who Would Cure Me Of Mad Cow Disease And Stop A Band Of Dark Energy From Destroying The Universe.

When You Peeled Back The Skin, You Were Dealing With Bone And Muscle, Blood And Nerve Endings. It Was All The Same. She Liked The Beautiful Logic Of The Circulatory System, The Elegance Of The Neurological, And The Fierce Warrior Spirit Of The Heart. The Body Had Rules And It Had Quirks.