Never Smile at Strangers

You don't need to talk to someone to know them. All you need to do is watch. See how they carry themselves. See how they treat others.

...It's better to feel the world around you. People let themselves become too desensitized. How can you write if you don't feel anything?

My mother always said that love is an entanglement. If you get too tangled, you lose yourself. It’s just a distraction. A way of escaping into someone else because you think that’ll be what finally makes you happy. Like a drug.

Moments later, the cowbells clattered, and Rachel Anderson, the creative-writing teacher from the community college, walked in. Rachel, wearing a floor-skimming lavender skirt, her long, blond hair pulled into a neat French braid, scanned the diner. Settling her sunglasses on the top of her head, she went to the counter and politely addressed the group.

Rachel was nowhere in sight. She was the one who comforted him with her warm smile and silent laughter. He could tell that she loved her family. She was the mother bird of the nest, the nurturer.

He was sure that people liked him because of the person he pretended to be.

We’re having such a hard time, Daddy,” she told him. “Everyone’s so miserable without you. I just want so badly for things to go back to the way they were.

You don’t need to talk to someone to know them. All you need to do is watch.

be. It just didn’t make sense. She thought about Haley. The rumble of an eighteen-wheeler grew closer, and she opened her eyes. The rig pulled

OPENING THE DOOR to her mother’s bedroom, Haley was stunned to see that her mother was awake. Crisp, dog-eared black-and-white photos and hundreds of newer color photographs were scattered all over the bed and floor. An empty scrapbook lay on her mother’s bureau next to a box of tissues.

Allie was so fragrant, just like an oleander, its beautiful pink blossoms disguising its fatal venom. Like the flower, she was poison. Most women were—except for Rachel Anderson, of course . . . and very few others.

Months of built-up hurt and frustration needed unleashing.

ballerina lay toppled over on her vanity table. A can of hairspray lay on its side on top of her bed, and clothes were strewn all over the carpet. The room smelled moldy. Wondering if there was a wet towel in Kelsey’s closet, Rachel walked across the room and opened the door. “What are you doing in here?

Lying was what kept him safe, alive, and relatively sane when he was little and

The asphalt was agonizing but also therapeutic in a way. A Southern antidepressant.