The Beginner's Guide to Living by Lia Hills

division the two parts of man, each desiring his other half, came together, and throwing their arms about one another, entwined in mutual embraces …
    So ancient is the desire of one another which is implanted in us, reuniting our original nature, seeking to make one of two, and to heal the state of man.
    I go to send Taryn this quote from Plato, but instead I send her one from a Russian playwright called Anton Chekhov. It says: Perhaps the feelings that we experience when we are in love represent a normal state. Being in love shows a person who he should be. And I send a photo I took in our garden, of a bush my mother planted last spring.

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    Beautiful. White jasmine is the Hindu symbol for love and commitment. Did you know that?
    â™¥ Taryn
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    No, I didn’t.
    Or maybe I did.
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    Memory.
    I am fifteen and at the movie theater with my mother. Dad didn’t come—he doesn’t like movies, they give him a headache. Mom sees me looking at a blond girl. The lights go dim. She leans over with her box of M&M’s, pours some into my hand, and whispers, “She’s cute.” I blush, but I don’t think she can see that in the dark. “I remember,” she says, “the first time I was really in love. It was like waking up.” We both eat M&M’s till the box is empty. When we leave the theater, the girl has already gone.

KNOW THYSELF
    â€œS O, W ILL. W HAT DO YOU WANT TO DO WITH YOUR LIFE?”
    Adam’s stabbing at his peas. Since Dad’s defaulted even on his minimalist level of parenting, I think Adam feels he should step up. My first instinct: tell him to get lost. When I was five, I was going to be a volcanologist, spend my days dodging pyroclastic flows and collecting igneous rocks, but now my future seems as full of holes as pumice. Before Mom died, there was this loose agreement about me going to university and studying math—Dad liked it because he thought I might end up working in finance like him, but I was thinking more about the theory of it, going beyond to where things blur. Quantum stuff. I remember Mom laughing, saying, “I want to know God’s thoughts; the rest are details.” She said it was a quote from Einstein, and after that it was all settled—Will’s future off the agenda. But now …
    â€œWell?”
    Adam’s moved on to his steak. I could ask him the same question, what he wants to do with his one, outrageously short life, but something about the way he’s peeling a piece of sinew away from the meat stops me. Anyway, a month ago, if someone had said I’d be tracking down philosophers and having sex, I would have told them they’d got the wrong guy.
    *   *   *
    Imagine you’re in the middle of the city, sitting on the concrete steps opposite the railway station, where the backpackers and office workers hang out. They’re all sunning themselves and eating their lunch, when this guy comes up to you. He’s kind of stubby with a fat gut and a squashed nose, and he sits down next to you on the step—let’s even imagine that he’s wearing a toga. He throws the dust-rimmed end of it over his shoulder, leans closer, and asks, “Is war bad?”
    â€œOf course it is,” you say, moving away along the step a bit. (I reckon he’d smell like damp sheep.) “People get killed.”
    â€œPeople get killed crossing the street. Is crossing the street bad?”
    â€œThat’s different,” you say. “That’s an accident.”
    â€œSo war’s bad because people kill other people on purpose?” he says, shading his balding head.
    â€œWell, yes.”
    â€œIs there ever a case when it’s okay to kill somebody on purpose? When it might even serve some good?”
    Your sandwich is curling at the edges, so you figure you might as well show him you can give as good as you get. “Sure, when the person has done something