"But I should be," Jake insisted, looking up at her, his blue eyes shining with tears that he was refusing to let fall. Then his face was pressed back against her shoulder. "I should be," he said again, his voice softer this time. "We had to save him. The writer. The van was coming. Roland was going to jump. He wanted to jump; it was him or me, and he wasn't going to let me fall again. He would have died, forsaken the Tower, and let all the worlds fall, because... because..." Because he loved me. The words wouldn't be spoken, but the sound of them in his mind had Jake clutching at her.
"His hip. He was trying to hide it. The arthritis. But his hip gave out, and he couldn't move, and I jumped. I pushed him out of the way, the writer. The van hit me instead. I knew I was dying. It'd happened before. But I wasn't supposed to move on." Jake's arms clung on tighter, trying to suppress the sobs wracking his shoulders. "I was supposed to be dead. I didn't want to be alone again."