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The ideation started when Maisie was nine and stuck around until twelve rounds of anesthetized, electricity-induced seizures banished it in her mid-twenties. She’s okay now, mostly, and grateful that she managed to claw her way through anguish to somehow find the sun. Every now and then, when things pile up and she starts to feel overwhelmed, the thoughts tease at her peripheries. Their periodic reemergence is equal parts relief and fear; but she’s never told anyone. Maisie doesn’t know how to explain that the same thoughts that tried to destroy her are familiar, comforting, the oldest friends she’s ever had.