August 3, 2005 My biggest regret is that I took it all for granted. Every hour, every minute. If things had turned out different, then I might have been able to salvage some part of my soul. But I didn’t, and so I ended up here. Thinking back, I wish that I could do it over. That day was a hot August afternoon, humid enough to make the very air stick to your skin. I had been desperate for an excuse to escape the house, filled with hot air despite the windows being thrown wide open. The reason didn’t matter, because I just needed a relief from the air cocooning me. That’s how I ended up with a $250 lamp braces against my leg, my mother rocketing down Highway 26 like there was a stampede behind us. “Can’t you go a little slower?” I complained, feeling the lampshade digging into my left leg. “Sera, don’t talk to me right now. I’m driving,” my mother said sternly. I scoffed, not understanding the reason for such a ridiculous comment. My mother had never said that before; our convers...