"Life exists for my punishment," he says as simply and solidly as claiming water is wet, and he shrugs at her. "It was my own fault, like everything else." Even the things that aren't, because it always comes back to him in his mind.

He motions at her.

"You had to have worn something less awful then, right? Everyone was done up in some kind of troll theme, or what the stylists thought troll theme meant."