"Green trees against the sky in the spring rain while the sky set off the spring trees in the obscuration. Red flowers dot the land in the breeze's chase while the land colored up in red after the kiss."
"To be or not to be: that is the question. That's from Hamlet's - maybe Shakespeare's - most famous soliloquy. I had to memorize the whole speech for sophomore English, and I can still remember every word. I didn't give it much thought back then. I just wanted to get all the words right and collect my A."
"That happens a lot with Shakespeare. The women go after what they want the men wind up suckered into things."
"You forget, time doesn't exist anymore. You gave it to me."
"But now here I am: No money. No place to stay. It should be my worst nightmare. But I don't care. It's funny the things you think you're scared of until they're upon you, and then you're not."
"You never know what will last."He said that earlier, about accidents, about never knowing which one is just a kink in the road and which one is a fork, about never knowing your life is changing until it's already happened."I think sometimes you do know," I say, my voice filling with emotion."
"I clap because I know what will happen when I stop. It's the same thing that happens when I turn off a really good movie - one that I've lost myself to - which is that I'll be thrown back to my own reality and something hollow will settle in my chest. Sometimes, I'll watch a movie all over again just to recapture that feeling of being inside something real. Which, I know, doesn't make any sense."
"I clap so that I can hold on to this feeling. I clap because I know what will happen when I stop. It’s the same thing that happens when I turn off a really good movie - one that I’ve lost myself to - which is that I’ll be thrown back to my own reality and something hollow will settle in my chest."
"It's just accidental, just temporary. Until the next accident sends me somewhere new. That's how life works."
"I want to undo this. To make it right. But I have no idea how. I don't seem to know how to open up to people without getting the door slammed in my face. So I do nothing."
"[My parents] always seemed less like lovebirds than like amiable business partners, for whom I'm the sole product."
"He gives me a little shrug, like, of course, why else? And at this point, I really have no right to be surprised by people's capacity for kindness and generosity, but still, I am. I'm floored every time."
"You thought too hard. Same with travel. You can't work too much at it, or it feels like work. You have to surrender yourself to the chaos. To the accidents."
"We can change in one day. We can fall in love in one day. Anything can happen in one day."
"The line between true self and feigned self is blurred on all sides."
"It feels like the city is telling secrets down here, privy only to those who think to listen."
"It's like you're averse to adventure."
"Oh honey, have you learned nothing from these plays? Ain't such a line between faking and being."
"I realize then that it's not enough to know what someone is called. You have to know who they are."
"I'll keep you here.' He taps his temple. 'Where you can't get lost."
"But then Mason touches my neck, to the spot on it where the cut from that night has since healed, and I pull away.He was right, after all; it didn't leave a scar, though part of me wishes it had. At least I'd have some evidence, some justification of this permanence. Stains are even worse when you're the only one who can see them."
"Forward momentum. That's my new motto. No regrets. And no going back."
"I didn't give it much thought back then. I just wanted to get all the words straight and collect my A."
"Don't worry, I plan on living a long time.""Why are you making a bucket list, then?""Because if you wait until you're really dying, it's too late."
"Willem laughs again. The sound is clear and strong as a bell, and it fills me with joy, and it's like, for the first time in my life, I understand that this is the point of laughter, to spread happiness."