And while this is a conversation Sookie's going to try to have out loud later, I would also point out the danger for our friends Tara and Sam. Tara spent all of last season unable to reconcile this shit with Lettie Mae. How can you love someone who abused you like that? You don't love them for abusing you, you love them regardless, because love isn't about them, it's about you, and your ability to love. Not, again, offering yourself for further abuse, or approving or supporting their behavior, because that's about them. But the part where you don't harbor your hate, or cuddle up close to it at night, or start a cult around it, that's on you. And as Maryann tears out her mothers' hearts, she's doing the same to Tara, by saying that loving yourself is the same as hating others. That making allowances for pleasure means showering in someone's sweat, or fucking in the garbage.

Sarah offers a little story, which may or may not be true. If it's not true, then Sarah Newlin is awesomely evil and a genius. But if it is true, that's a big step toward not demonizing the Newlins, because we don't live in a universe where cartoonishly evil people do cartoonishly hateful things: everybody has a reason. That's what makes this show good. "When the vampires came out of the coffin, I went with my big sister Amber to march for their equal rights," Sarah begins, sad and embarrassed. Jason's surprised. Her face goes dark: "Two months later, Amber disappeared. Got hooked on V. I know they killed her. Got rid of her body in whatever way they do..." He apologizes, because he knows their ways well enough to know that saying he's not a vampire victim is the same thing as saying Amber's better off. "They stole my sister, Jason. The same way they stole your girlfriend and grandmother. And I know you believe Eddie was your friend, but think about it: If his kind never existed, the people you love would still be alive."

Which is logically true, technically, and having taken the struts out of the one thing that has kept Jason alive for years at this point -- his belief that a person's worth is always higher than the value of their darkest sin -- strands him in a weird part of the forest. "You're saying... If I hadn't been too messed up to protect them, that they'd still be here?" And while this is good, in that self-esteem is one thing that keeps people out of cults, she's supposed to be building him up right now: "No! You're just human! But vampires? Everything they are, down to their very blood, is seductive." Which he knows, from every angle; which pulled him once down the same path as Drew Marshall. Which he knows from every angle, because he still wants it. That feeling, in the sun and the rain, watching Amy soar.