Sarah called Donald a few days later. Wasn't he supposed to call her? She arranged another rendezvous. He said something so remarkable that it was all she could remember of the evening. They were walking along the Hudson River at night and the cool wind and the rectangles of light on the water were so refreshing.
He said, "I can't help it. It frightens me sometimes. I feel so much love I'm sure that I won't be able to stand it, but then it passes through me, like a ghost train, and, and, it's infinite."
"Yeah," she said. "Falling in love is so scary."
"No, not that. Love for everything, everything that breathes and doesn't breathe, for things bigger than the sky, for things so tiny we'll never see them, because it's all part of it. You can't get away from it."
"Get away from what?"
"From anything. Because you're part of it. Just like the trunk of a tree can't get away from the tree."
"But that is the tree."
"Right. Exactly."
Sarah didn't feel like the trunk of anything. She felt like a leaf. Leaves get away from the tree all the time. Even the name of it: leaves.