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From BREAKING BUTTERFLIESCadence was one of those children everyone was stunned by. He was an excellent artist even when he was little. While I was just beginning to draw stick figures, he was drawing amazing pictures of people, like some prodigy. While I still stuttered and baby-talked, he amazed people with his long sentences and perfect speech while I clung to my mother, he was totally independent, and he always got what he wanted. And while I was a slightly pudgy, brown-haired child, indistinguishable from the masses of little girls in the world, he was a striking little wisp of a kid, his face a sharp white angle surrounded by wavy blond hair, his eyes a fierce shade of ice blue. I always felt vaguely stupid when I was around him. I was simply too ordinary, while he was this vision of talent and good looks, whirling through life and dazzling everyone with his greatness. I never really hated him for making me feel less than him I was just in awe. I thought of him as shining, always shining. But light can be blinding, it can shine so hard into your eyes that you don't realize what's behind it — and then, like a car hidden behind glaring headlights, it hits you at full speed.
