It's always too late for sorries$$$ but I appreciate the sentiment.

A story only matters$$$ I suspect$$$ to the extent that the people in the story change.

He was painfully shy$$$ which$$$ as is often the manner of the painfully shy$$$ he overcompensated for by being too loud at the wrong times.

For love is no part of the dreamworld. Love belongs to Desire$$$ and Desire is always cruel.

Nothing's ever the same$$$ she said. "Be it a second later or a hundred years. It's always churning and roiling. And people change as much as oceans."

I miss you'$$$ he admitted.<br/>'I'm here'$$$ she said.<br/>'That's when I miss you most. When you're here. When you aren't here$$$ when you're just a ghost of the past or a dream from another life$$$ it's easier then.'

I went away in my head$$$ into a book. That was where I went whenever real life was too hard or too inflexible.

We...we could be friends.<br/>"We COULD be rare specimens of an exotic breed of dancing African elephants$$$ but we're not. At least$$$ I'M not."

Books were safer than other people anyway.

I lived in books more than I lived anywhere else.