" Fumbling in the dark, Josie reached underneath the frame of her bed for the plastic bag she’d
stashed-her supply of sleeping pills. She was no better than any of the other stupid people in this
world who thought if they pretended hard enough, they could make it so. She’d thought that death
could be an answer, because she was too immature to realize it was the biggest question of all.
Yesterday, she hadn’t known what patterns blood could make when it sprayed on a whitewashed
wall. She hadn’t understood that life left a person’s lungs first, and their eyes last. She had pictured
suicide as a final statement, a fuck you to the people who hadn’t understood how hard it was for her
to be the Josie they wanted her to be. She’d somehow thought that if she killed herself, she’d be
able to watch everyone else’s reaction; that she’d get the last laugh. Until yesterday, she hadn’t
really understood. Dead was dead. When you died, you did not get to come back and see what you
were missing. You didn’t get to apologize. You didn’t get a second chance.
Death wasn’t something you could control. In fact, it would always have the upper hand. "
― Jodi Picoult , Nineteen Minutes