Prologue Nova Sometimes I wonder if there are some memories the mind doesn’t want to deal with and that if it really wants to, it can block out the images, shut down, numb the pain connected to what we saw—what we didn’t want to see. If we allow it to, the numbness can drown out everything, even the spark of life inside us. And eventually the person we once were is nothing but a vanishing memory. I didn’t always use to think this way. I used to have hope. I used to believe in things. Like when my father told me if I wanted something bad enough that I could make it happen. “No one else in the world can make things happen for you, Nova,” he’d said while we were lying on our backs on the hill in our backyard, staring up at the stars. I was six and happy and a little naïve, eating his words up like handfuls of sugar. “But if you want something bad enough and are willing to work hard at it, then anything’s possible.” “Anything?” I’d said, turning my head toward him. “Even if I want to be a princess?” He smiled, looking genuinely happy. “Even a princess.” I grinned, looking up at the sky, thinking how wonderful it would be to wear a diamond tiara on my head and