"I'm going to die". (...)
"I shall manage. Don't you worry about me,"
Jack said between clenched teeth.
Joy shook her head. "I think it can be better than that.
Better than just managing. What I'm trying to say is that
the pain, then, is part of the happiness, now."
(...)
"Why love, if losing hurts so much? I have no answers anymore,
only the life I've lived. Twice in that life I've been given
the choice, as a boy, and as a man.
The boy chose safety. The man chooses suffering.
The pain, now, is part of the happiness, then.
That's the deal."
Jack Lewis put his pen down and smiled, thinking of Joy.
He wished he could read her these words, but never mind.
Jack had a feeling she had heard them;
she was never far away from him now.
-- Leonore Fleisher, Shadowlands (Clive S. Lewis (Jack) and Joy Gresham)
