Re: hannah and david: woods
He asked why it had ended with Hugh, and she didn't answer, but 'collapse' likely answered itself, and it was her business. Hannah deserved someone who didn't let things collapse. It seemed that the rug had been pulled out from under her more than often enough to deserve what was astable and good.
"What a joyful fate," he said. He didn't like parties. He hadn't loved them before, when he was alive - he had preferred a group of vibrant friends, or sitting side by side with someone down the pub when that was still part of his life. When he had still thought he might be a musician he had played a good share of house parties, and his eye always gravitated toward the people who were too drunk, or lonely inside themselves like Hannah said she'd been. "Who did you waltz with?" So it wasn't a total loss. "Oh, it doesn't matter that they were nice," he said. Nice people could still make you feel lonely. Nice people could hide cruelty, too.
He dipped his head, and said, almost as an inside joke, "Your sister asked me if I kill people."
He looked at Hannah when she said someone had climbed inside her head. Around them, the shadows felt dark and deep. "Did she do it without permission?" It seemed a thing to take in stride, the fact that a person could do this. Not that they had done it, to Hannah, just that they could.