Stice stuck to the window (p. 870)
Imagining it seemed somehow unendurable: me just sitting there, stuck, well before sunrise, alone, too embarrassed to call out, my own exhalations fouling the window and denying me even a view to divert attention from the horror. I stood there horrified, admiring The Darkness’s ballsy calm.
Context
Pre-dawn of the 20 Nov blizzard: Hal, ten days off marijuana and feeling worst before sunrise, finds Stice with his forehead frozen fast to the hall window, stuck since about 0100 and too embarrassed to yell. What horrifies Hal isn't the cold — it's the duration, hours of stuck time with nothing to divert attention. His word is the Abiding lexicon's word, inverted: Ennet House teaches that no single moment is unendurable, and Hal finds the mere imagining of the moments unendurable. Hal's dread of stuck time is the E.T.A.-side negative of Gately's ward-bed practice.