Background Image

...

Looking Back, It Was The Thing In His Life That Shamed Him The Most: The Times He Was Purposefully, Calculatingly Mean To Alice. It Was Those Moments, And There Had Been Many Of Them, That Indicated To Him That He Was Not A Good Person. He Got Mad At Her For Many Things, But It Was Always Really For The Same Thing: That She Possessed His Love And He Couldn't Seem To Get It Back. She Didn't Deserve It, Which Was To Say She Deserved Better

-Ann Brashares

...

Please Wait....
Translating....

Looking Back, It Was

Ann Brashares

...

Looking Back, It Was The Thing In His Life That Shamed Him The Most: The Times He Was Purposefully, Calculatingly Mean To Alice. It Was Those Moments, And There Had Been Many Of Them, That Indicated To Him That He Was Not A Good Person. He Got Mad At Her For Many Things, But It Was Always Really For The Same Thing: That She Possessed His Love And He Couldn't Seem To Get It Back. She Didn't Deserve It, Which Was To Say She Deserved Better

Views: 6

Topic

More From Ann Brashares

If You Ever Meet A Guy And You Fall In Love With Him, But Because Of Some Weird Genetic Mutation He Doesn't Seem To Return The Feeling?... Wear That Dress.

Falling In Love

But Will He Come I Just Want To Know What You Think The Odds Are. Tell Me What You Really Think." "i Think Tibby Was A Wise Girl. I Think She Loved You.

There Was Love Expressed In The Places You Usually Forget To Look.

Some People Fall In Love Over And Over Again While Some People Can Only Do It Once.

Falling In Love

He's Had A Lot Of Chances To Care, And He Hasn't.

Don't Talk To Me. I'm Tired And Grumpy And I'll Probably Make Fun Of You.

Tibby Was Shaking Her Head. "what?" Bailey Asked. "nothing. Just That You Suprise Me Every Day," Tibby Said. Bailey Smiled At Her. "i Like That You Let Yourself Be Suprised.

Carmen Sat Up When She Heard A Familiar Trill From Her Computer. It Was An Instant Message From Bee. Beezy3: Packing. Do You Have My Purple Sock With The Heart On The Ankle? Carmabelle: No. Like I'd Wear Your Socks. Carmen Looked From Her Computer Screen Down To Her Feet. To Her Dismay, Her Socks Were Two Faintly Different Shades Of Purple. She Rotated Her Foot To Get A View Of Her Anklebone. Carmabelle: Ahem. Might Possibly Have Sock.

When I Turned Fifteen, I Remember My Father Gave Me A Credit Card Which I Was Allowed To Use For Two Things: Emergencies And Books.

She Hadn't Chosen The Brave Life. She'd Chosen The Small, Fearful One.

It’s Natural To Overlook And Even Sacrifice The Things That Belong To Us Most Easily Most Gracefully. So Here’s Me Asking You To Please Not Make That Mistake.

She Knew That When She Got Old It Would Be More Fun To Look Back On A Life Of Romance And Adventure Than A Life Of Quiet Habits. But Looking Back Was Easy. It Was The Doing That Was Painful. There Were Plenty Of Things She Would Like To Look Back On But Wasn't Willing To Risk.

It Was Frustrating When People Loved You And Took An Interest In You And Sometimes Worried About You And Personally Cared What You Did With Yourself. Lena Wished That Love Were Something You Could Flip On And Off. You Could Turn It On When You Felt Good Bout Yourself And Worthy Of It And Generous Enough To Return It. You Could Clip It Off When You Needed To Hide Or Self-destruct And Had Nothing At All To Give." (lena, 194)

You Could Feel Things Or You Could Find A Way To Shut Down. But Once You Were Feeling Things, You Couldn’t Decide Exactly What To Feel. That Was The Trouble With Letting Them In At All. They Made A Mess Of The Place.

You Hold On To Old Experiences: Injuries, Injustices, And Great Love Affairs, Too. And You Hold Them In Your Joints And Your Organs, And Wear Them On Your Skin.

You Know What The Secret Is? It's So Simple. We Love One Another. We're Nice To One Another. Do You Know How Rare That Is? - Carmen

I Did Love Her. I've Loved Her From The First Time I Saw Her.

When Your About To Criticize Someone Walk A Mile In Thier Shoes, That Way When You Criticize Them You're A Mile Away From Them And You Have Their Shoes

Once Paul Told Her That The Beach Was Like Him Because It Changed Every Day But It Never Made Any Progress. Later She Remembered Thinking That A Normal Person Might Have Begun By Saying That He Was Like The Beach.

People Left A Lot Of Things Behind When They Went In The Water. Their Clothes, Their Stuff, Their Makeup, Their Fixed-up Hair, Their Voices, Their Hearing, Their Sight--at Least As They Normally Experienced Them....some People Lost Their Individuality In The Water, But Riley Always Felt Most Herself. Water Was Supposed To Symbolize Renewal, She Knew, But When Riley Swam, Pared Down, Alone, And Unreachable--she Felt A Deeper Sense Of Who She Already Was.

Try, Reach, Want, And You May Fall. But Even If You Do, You Might Be Okay Anyway. If You Don't Try, You Save Nothing, Because You Might As Well Be Dead.

I Did The Searching And Remembering, She Did The Disappearing And The Forgetting.

And I Thought About The Color And I Realized What Blue It Was. It Was The Soft And Changeable, Essential Blue Of A Well-worn Pair Of Pants. Pants = Love

I'm Writing This Down, Because It Is Going To Be Hard For Me To Say It. Because This Is Probably Our Last Time Just Us. See, I Can Write That Down, But I Don't Think I Can Say It. I'm Not Doing This To Say Goodbye, Though I Know That Has To Be Part Of It. I'm Doing It To Thank You For All We Have Had And Done And Been For One Another, To Say I Love You For Making This Life Of Mine What It Is. Leaving You Is The Hardest Thing I Have To Do. But The Thing Is, The Best Parts Of Me Are In You, All Three Of You. You Are Who I Am, And What I Cherish In Myself Stays On In You.

Maybe, Sometimes, It's Easier To Be Mad At The People You Trust Because You Know They'll Always Love You, No Matter What.

Looking Back, It Was The Thing In His Life That Shamed Him The Most: The Times He Was Purposefully, Calculatingly Mean To Alice. It Was Those Moments, And There Had Been Many Of Them, That Indicated To Him That He Was Not A Good Person. He Got Mad At Her For Many Things, But It Was Always Really For The Same Thing: That She Possessed His Love And He Couldn't Seem To Get It Back. She Didn't Deserve It, Which Was To Say She Deserved Better

What Can I Say? I'm Obsessed. And As We All Know Obsessed Girls Can't Be Held Responsible For Our Actions.

She Closed Her Eyes. "i Didn't Know That. I Didn't Know Anything. It Scares Me The Things I Told Myself. But I Would Have Told Myself Almost Anything, Because I Wanted To Believe Him." "why?" "because I Wanted To Be With You.

Don't Ask Me Any Questions Right Now. I'm Grumpy And I'll Probablly Make Fun Of You. -effie Kaligaris

I Do Believe That Characters In Novels Belong To Their Writers And Their Readers Pretty Equally. I've Learned A Lot Of Things About The Characters I Write From People Who Read About Them. Readers Expand Them In Ways I Don't Think Of And Take Them To Places I Can't Go.

All I Could Think To Do Was Love Her. That's All A Person Can Do.

She Spilled Rice On My Knee, And She Smiled. I Wanted Her To Spill A Thousand Things On Me, Lava, Acid, Bricks, Anything, And Smile Each Time

Maybe You Think You’ll Be Entitled To More Happiness Later By Forgoing All Of It Now, But It Doesn’t Work That Way. Happiness Takes As Much Practice As Unhappiness Does. It’s By Living That You Live More. By Waiting You Wait More. Every Waiting Day Makes Your Life A Little Less. Every Lonely Day Makes You A Little Smaller. Every Day You Put Off Your Life Makes You Less Capable Of Living It.

Everything I Ever Said To You Was True And Is True.

Sometimes It Is A Relief To Be Invisible

You Remember What Is Lost, And You Forget What's Right In Front Of You.

Love Yourself And Your Friends Unconditionally .

The Bottom Had Arrived. She Crashed Against It, But It Brought No Sense Of Closure Or Understanding. She Just Lay There At The Bottom Looking Up. She Knew There Must Be A Very Tiny Circle Of Light Up There Somewhere, But Just Now She Couldn’t See It.

Some Things Have To Be Believed To Be Seen. -ralph Hodgson

It's Always Nervewracking To Put Yourself Out There. But It's The Root Of Joy.

Putting Yourself Out There

Marnie Loved Her Better And More Honestly Than Anyone Else In The World, With The Possible Exception Of Her Mother, Who Loved Her Intensely If Not Honestly.

But It Was Smell That Carried Memory.

She Glared At Him, Feeling The Old Frustration. Sometimes In His Presence She Felt The Deepest Connection To Him, And Other Times She Felt Completely Alone-as Though Any Bond To Him Was Her Own Bitter Imagination.

I Killed Her Once And Died For Her Many Times And I Still Have Nothing To Show For It. I Always Search For Her ; I Always Remember Her. I Carry The Hope That Someday She Will Remember Me.

How Terrible Would It Be To Just Wait There Pathetically Alone For Him Never To Show Up?" Eudoxia's Expression Grew More Serious. "that's What You're Doing Anyway, My Dear.

I Sometimes Think The Stronger You Feel About Someone, The Harder It Is To Picture Their Face When You Are Away From Them.

She Remembered Me.' This Was His Worst Weakness, His Most Toxic Drug.

All My Life, Everybody Has Seen Me A Certain Way. What Do You See?

She Went Around With A Broken Heart, And She Wasn't Sure Who'd Broken It. She Thought It Was Herself, Mostly.

It Took The Real Thing To Show You The Size Of Your Delusions.

When There Is Nothing, There Is The Possibility Of Everything.

Women Always Seemed To Bring The Size They Wished They Were To The Fitting Room, Rather Than The Size That Would Actually Fit.

I Knew Her Hair And Her Coloring And Her Shapes Would Be Different Next Time, But The Way She Wore Her Body Would Keep On.

Maybe The Truth Is, There's A Little Bit Of Loser In All Of Us. Being Happy Isn't Having Everything In Your Life Be Perfect. Maybe It's About Stringing Together All The Little Things.

Someday When You're Twenty, Maybe, I'll See You Again. You'll Be This Hot Soccer Star At Some Great School, With A Million Guys More Interesting Than I Am Chasing You Down. And You Know What? I'll See You And I'll Pray You Want Me Still.

Alice Suspected Paul Couldn’t Really Picture His Father, Just Like She Couldn’t Picture Paul When He Was Away. Maybe That Was The Case With People You Wanted More Than Was Good For You.

I Told Him, Though, That He Better Be Good To You. When You Came Along, I Said I'd Share You, But I Told Him To Remember That You're My Sister. I Loved You First.

Starting Is Hard So I Really Need To Give Myself Permission To Do A Bad Job. I Always Give Myself Leave To Write Total Nonsense For As Long As I Need To Release The Pressure, Because It's Really Hard To Start If You Feel Like That First Sentence You Write Has To Actually Mean Something.

Tibby Sat On The Outside Of A Group Of Kids In The Film Program. There Was A Lot Of Dark Clothing And Heavy Footwear, And Quite A Few Piercings Glinting In Sunlight. They Had Invited Her To Sit With Them While They All Finished Up Their Lunches Before Film Seminar. Tibby Knew That They Had Invited Her Largely Because She Had A Ring In Her Nose. This Bugged Her Almost As Much As When People Excluded Her Because She Had A Ring In Her Nose.

She Wasn't As Destructive As Bee. She Had Never Been As Dramatic. Rather, She'd Slipped Carefully, Stealthily Away From Her Ghosts.

She Felt Like Parts Of Her Soul Were Missing, Had Left Her Body Long Ago. It Had Happened Not In Greece Three Months Ago, But Long Before That. It Was In Greece That She'd Realized Those Parts Had Left Her And Were Not Coming Back.

What Happened To Me By Myself Felt Partly Dreamed, Partly Imagined, Definitely Shifted And Warped By My Own Fears And Wants. But Who Knows? Maybe There Is More Truth In How You Feel Than In What Actually Happens.

During Intermission She Peeked Out At The Theater, Watching It Refill. When It Was Almost Full And The Lights Blinked On And Off, She Saw Three People File In Through The Center Door And Her Breath Caught. Time Lapsed As They Walked Down The Center Aisle: Three Teenage Girls All In A Row. They Were So Big, So Bright, So Beautiful, So Magnificent To Carmen’s Eyes That She Thought She Was Imagining Them. They Were Like Goddesses, Like Titans. She Was So Proud Of Them! They Were Benevolent And They Were Righteous. Now, These Were Friends.

Sometimes You Need To Make A Mess. -loretta, The Rollinses' Hosekeeper

Bridget Cried For The Leavers And The Left. For The People, Like Herself, Grimly Forsaking What Precious Gifts They Would Ever Get.

You Surround Yourself With Your Pain Or You Avoid It And Let It Find You When You Are Trying To Do Other Things

Surround Yourself

Carmen Hated The 'life Is Too Short" Rationalization. She Thought It Was One Of The Lamer Excuses In The History Of Excuse-making. Whenever You Did Something Because "life Is Too Short Not To," You Could Be Sure Life Would Be Just Long Enough To Punish You For It.

Life Is Too Short

Love Demands Everything, They Say, But My Love Demands Only This: That No Matter What Happens Or How Long It Takes, You`ll Keep Faith In Me, You`ll Remember Who We Are, And You`ll Never Feel Despair.

Love Didn't Necessarily Look The Way You Expected It To.

When You Feel Someone Else's Pain And Joy As Powerfully As If It Were Your Own, Then You Know You Really Loved Them.

Inspirational Love

The Problem Is Not The Problem. The Problem Is Your Attitude About The Problem. Got That? -coach Brevin

She Used To Cry Roughly Three Times A Year. Now She Seemed To Cry Three Times Before Breakfast. Could That Be Considered Progress?

Why Does He Have To Be My Boyfriend? Are You Inferior If You Don't Have A Boyfriend? Why Does Everybody Have To Be In Love With Somebody?

There Was A Moment In Between, A Moment Flung Free In The Midst Of The Transition, When He Made Contact. That Was The Moment She Would Dwell On.

He Could Lose Himself In Her Forever, He Thought.

Her Vision Of The World Under The Water Represented A Beautiful Stillness, A Version Of Heaven. It Was The Lost City Of Lena, Her Alternate Universe, The Life She Yearned For But Didn't Get To Have.

Maybe They Would Look At Each Other And Feel Some Odd Yearning, But Neither Of Them Would Know Why. They Would Want To Stop, But They Would Be Embarrassed, And Neither Would Know What To Say. They Would Go Their Separate Ways. Who Knew? Maybe That Happened Every Day To People Who'd Once Loved Each Other.

Your Problem Isn't The Problem, It's Your Attitude About The Problem.

I Allowed Myself To Suffer How Jarringly Destructive The Present Feels And How Fragile The Past.

One Must Have A Good Memory To Keep The Promises One Has Made.

The Path Of Your Life Can Change In An Instant.

Life Can Change In An Instant

The Dreams Weren’t As Pleasing When They Had No Chance Of Coming True

For Some Reason Our Lives Were Marked By Summers. . . . Summer Was The Time When Our Lives Joined Completely, When We All Had Our Birthdays, When Really Important Things Happened

She Never Showed Girly Weaknesses Like Cellulite Or Crushes. She Never Lingered On Injustices Committed Against Her.

If You Didn't Have A Choice, You Had To Make A Choice. If You Didn't Have Options, You Made Some. You Couldn't Just Let This World Happen To You... He Didn't See Eternity. He Saw This Girl And This Moment And This One Slim Chance.

As Much As I'm Drawn To Writing About Teenage Girls, I Like The Idea Of Having The Freedom To Branch Out And Write About Different Ages, For Different Ages.

Let Me Love You, But Don't Love Me Back. Do Love Me And Let Me Hate You For A While. Let Me Feel Like I Have Some Control, Because I Know I Never Do.

You Get Older And You Learn There Is One Sentence Just Four Worlds Long And If You Can Say It To Yourself It Offers More Comfort Than Almost Any Other. It Goes Like This… Ready ” “ready.” “at Least I Tried.

I Look Back On My 20s. It's Supposed To Be The Prime Of Your Life, The Most Vital, The Most Beautiful. But You're Making Your Critical Decisions And Sometimes Your Most Critical Mistakes.

Critical Decisions

I Think Pants Have Unique Qualities, Especially In A Woman’s Life. Whatever Bodily Insecurities We Have, We Seem To Take Out On Our Pants.

She Must Have Sensed She Never Really Had Him. That Was A Sadness Of Hers, He Knew.

This Body Is Breaking Down, But I Am Not.

Sometimes He Felt Sure That The Key To Happiness Was A Poor Memory.

Knowing Where She Was In The World, Even If He Never Touched Her, Gave Him A Deep Satisfaction, And He Half Despised Himself For Being Satisfied With So Little.

What You Leave Behind Is The People You Loved. You Leave Yourself In Them.

Everything Good Requires Sacrifices.

A Lot Of Friendship Is About Practice, That’s Something I’ve Learned As I’ve Gotten Older. It’s Not Simply Some Spiritual Soul-bond Of Memories And Longings, It’s Really About Having Coffee Every Week, Or Talking On The Phone Every Day Or Every Other Day - Whatever Suits You.

Every Life I Start With Her, My Original Sin. I Know Myself Through Her.

Do You Have Any Idea How Much I've Loved You?

She Realized All At Once The Deeper Thing That Bothered Her, The Thing That Made Him Not Just Irritating But Intolerable: How He Kept Loving Her Blindly When She Deserved It So Little.

As A Writer, You Live In Such Isolation. It's Hard To Imagine Your Book Has A Life Beyond You.

The Present No Matter What I Brought Couldn’t Change The Past. The Past Was Set And Sealed.

Sex Could Be A Blissful Communion,. But It Could Also Be A Weapon, And Its Absence, Sometimes, Was Required For The Establishment Of Peace.

Something About Giving In Without A Fight Felt Wrong.

Tibby's Wish Would Be To Hold On To The Idea Of Love Even In The Face Of Darkest Doubt. Because That Was The Way In Which She Failed. Not Once, But Again And Again.

Shy” Was The Sympathetic Interpretation She Got From Older People. “snotty” Was The Interpretation She Got From People Her Own Age.

It Was A Blessing And Also A Curse Of Handwritten Letters That Unlike Email You Couldn’t Obsessively Reread What You’d Written After You’d Sent It. You Couldn’t Attempt To Un-send It. Once You’d Sent It It Was Gone. It Was An Object That No Longer Belonged To You But Belonged To Your Recipient To Do With What He Would. You Tended To Remember The Feeling Of What You’d Said More Than The Words. You Gave To Object Away And Left Yourself With The Memory. That Was What It Was To Give.

Wish For What You Want, Work For What You Need. -carmen's Grandmother

He Tricked Himself Into Thinking That She Would Look Into His Eyes And Remember, That Love Would Conquer All.

She Wondered If Maybe Tragedy Was What It Took To Make Your Heart Capable Of Admitting A New Member.

Forget Jack, I'm In Love With The Cold, Dirt Floor.

She Wanted Him To See All Of Her And Also None Of Her. She Wanted Him To Be Dazzled By The Bits And Blinded By The Whole. She Wanted Him To See Her Whole And Not In Pieces. She Had Hopes That Were Hard To Satisfy.

Different People Were Good At Different Things, Lena Mused. Lena Was Good At Writing Thank-you Notes, For Instance, And Effie Was Good At Being Happy.

A Tree Is Such A Rich Metaphor In A Million Beautiful Ways. You Can Consider A Tree Growing And Consider Its Connectedness To All Things Above And Under The Ground.

She Was Supposed To Be Putting Her Life Together Right Now, And All She Could Seem To Do Was Throw Grenades At It.

The Weather Turned. Her Skin Seemed To Grow A Million Extra Pores, And All Of Them Opened To Take In The Warmth And Tenderness Of The Air. The Sun On Her Face Made Her Want To Cry. Into All Those Millions Of Open Pores Came The Sunshine, And Other Feelings As Well. In And Out. She Was Porous.

Can You Make Yourself Love? Can You Make Yourself Loved? -lena Kaligaris

I Killed Her Once And Died For Her Many Times

Because She Was Raw And Uncertain, And She Liked To Keep All The Messy Parts Of Herself To Herself. ... As Much As Lena Liked To Hide The Mess And Display The Finished Product, By This Point She Was All Mess And No Product.

Grief Was Like A Newborn, And The First Three Months Were Hard As Hell, But By Six Months You'd Recognized Defeat, Shifted Your Life Around, And Made Room For It.

What If People Knew They Were Recycled? Would That Change Anything?

She Kept Walking. The Very Small, Brave Part Of Her Brain Knew That This Would Be Her One Chance. If She Turned Around, She Would Lose It.

He Took Her Hand And They Started Walking Toward The Baggage Claim. They Didn't Say Anything To Each Other. They Swung Their Held Hands Like Little Kids, Like They Believed Anything Could Happen, Like They Might Take Off Soaring Into The Air. All The Things You Wanted To Happen Could Happen. Why Not?

He Just Wanted To Look At Her And Know Her Life Was Marching Along Under The Same Arch Of Time And Space As He Is.

There Was Nothing New In Sitting On This Dock, On This Or That Wooden Bench, Watching For His Boat To Come. In Some Ways, She Was Always Waiting For Him.

He'd Pushed Her. He'd Scared Her. He'd Besieged Her. He'd Vowed He Wouldn't, And He Did.

But I Know This. We're Ready To Move Forward Again In Our Way. Together Or Apart, No Matter How Far Apart, We Live In One Another. We Go On Together.

Life Isn't Just Fair. It's Just Fairer Than Death, That's All. -william Goldman

You Forget Your Victories, But You Remember The Losses.

You Have Been With Me From The Very First Life. You Are My First Memory Every Time, The Single Thread In All Of My Lives. It`s You Who Makes Me A Person.

She Perched On Her Windowsill, Gazing At The Lurid Sun Soaking Into The Caldera, Trying To Appreciate It Even Though She Couldn’t Have It. Why Did She Always Feel She Had To Do Something In The Face Of Beauty?

Parents Were The Only Ones Obligated To Love You; From The Rest Of The World You Had To Earn It.

Lena Knew She Had Spent Too Much Of Her Life In A State Of Passive Dread, Just Waiting For Something Bad To Happen. In A Life Like That, Relief Was As Close As You Got To Happiness.

He Wanted To Take His Love Back From Her So Badly. The Old Techniques Didn’t Work Anymore. In Fact, They’d Never Worked. How Do You Stop Loving Someone? It Was One Of The World’s More Brutal Mysteries. The More You Tried, The Less It Worked.

She Cared About Him Too Much, And He Was A Dangerous Person To Love. He Wouldn't Love Her Back.

He Loved Her For Being So Beautiful, And He Hated Her For It. He Loved How She Put Shiny Stuff On Her Lips For Him, And He Also Reviled Her For It. He Wanted Her To Walk Home Alone, And He Wanted To Run After Her And Grab Her Up Before She Could Take Another Step.

He Took Her In His Arms Right Away. "i'm So Sorry," He Murmured In Her Ear. He Rocked Her, Saying It Over And Over. But No Matter How Many Times He Said It, No Matter How Much She Knew He Meant It, The Words Stirred Around In Her Ear But Didn't Get Into Her Brain. Sometimes He Could Comfort Her. Sometimes He Said What She Needed, But Today He Couldn't Reach Her. Nothing Could.

How Sad It Was, Carmen Thought, That You Acted Awful When You Were Desperately Sad And Hurt And Wanted To Be Loved. How Tragic Then, The Way Everyone Avoided You And Tiptoed Around You When You Really Needed Them. Carmen Knew This Vicious Predicament As Well As Anyone In The World. How Bitter It Felt When You Acted Badly To Everyone And Ended Up Hating Yourself The Most.

So Far, She’d Been Her Usual Lame Self: Solitary And Routine-loving, Carefully Avoiding Any Path That Might Lead To Spontaneous Human Interaction. Lena Kaligaris

She Had Never Had A Boy Talk To Her Like That. There Was No Cover Of Bullshit, No Flirtation, No Added Charm, But His Look Was Searing. He Was Different From Anyone She Had Known.

She Wondered Again About Her Inclination To Wish For Things That Made Her So Deeply Unhappy.

Today Is The Tomorrow We Worried About Yesterday.

I Like That You Let Yourself Be Surprised

At The Worst Possible Moment, The Most Painful, Darkest Moment When You Can't Take It Anymore And You Are Afraid, That Is When A Feeling Of Peace And Comfort Will Come Over You, And It's Like Nothing You've Ever Felt.

When You Remembered To Forget, You Were Remembering. It Was When You Forgot To Forget That You Forgot.

Healing Wasn’t Always The Best Thing. Sometimes A Hole Was Better Left Open. Sometimes It Healed Too Thick And Too Well And Left Separate Pieces Fused And Incompetent. And It Was Harder To Reopen After That.

He Was The Strangest Of Strangers In That He Was Also Her Oldest Friend.

She Thought She Would Know When It Happened. But Now, As She Looked Around, She Wondered If It Was Really Like That At All. Maybe It Happened In A Million Different Ways, When You Were Thinking Of It And You Weren't. Maybe There Was No Gap, No Jump, No Chasm. You Didn't Forget Yourself All At Once. Maybe You Just Looked Around One Time Or Another And You Thought, Hey. And There You Were.

I Agree That A Love Of Reading Is A Great Gift For A Parent To Pass On To His Or Her Child.

She Wasn’t Sure If He Wanted More From Her Or If He Wanted Less. Maybe It Was Both. Maybe It Was Always Both.

I Love Her. I Need Her. I Gave Away Everything I Had For Her. I Just Wanted Her To Know Me.

It Was Their Mothers, Long Ago. Tibby Noted With Joy That All Four Of Them Were Wearing Jeans.

I Love That Blurry Place Where Life’s Transitions Are Made Without You Even Knowing It.

Maybe Happiness Was Just A Matter Of The Little Upticks- The Traffic Signal That Said "walk" The Second You Go There- And Downticks- The Itch Tag At The Back Of Your Collar- That Happened To Every Person In The Course Of The Day. Maybe Everybody Had The Same Allotted Measure Of Happiness Within Each Day.

You'll Turn Out Ordinary If You're Not Careful.

She Existed In Her Friends; There She Was. All The Parts Of Herself She'd Forgotten. She Knew Herself Best When She Was With Them.

How Is It That A Person Could Be So Relieved And So Disappointed, Both At The Same Time.

Her Body Was A Prison, Her Mind Was A Prison. Her Memories Were A Prison. The People She Loved. She Couldn't Get Away From The Hurt Of Them. She Could Leave Eric, Walk Out Of Her Apartment, Walk Forever If She Liked, But She Couldn't Escape What Really Hurt. Tonight Even The Sky Felt Like A Prison.

I Love The Idea Of Fictional Worlds Kind Of All Cohering In Some Way.

I Dont Really Write With The Idea Of Trying To Teach Any Lessons. I Want To Tell A Story As Truthfully And Engagingly As I Can, And Then Let The Chips Fall Where They May.

No Matter How Far Back You Cut A Willow Tree, It Will Never Really Die.

She Thought She Was Independent And Strong, But She Got One Small Taste Of Love And She Was Hungrier Than Anyone. She Was Ravenous.

She'd Loved Him As Much As He'd Let Her. More Than He'd Let Her.

The Distinction Has Blurred Between Young Adult And Adult Books. Some Of The Teen Books Have Become More Sophisticated.

There Were Certain Qualities You Possessed Carelessly. And You Couldn't Retrieve Them When They Were Gone. The Very Act Of Caring Made Them Impossible To Regain.

Marnie Hated To See Her Spend So Much Of Herself On Someone Who Didn't Care.

How Could You Cleanse Yourself If You Couldn’t Forget?

Relief Is A Short-lived Emotion, Passive And Thin. The Agony Of Doubt Disappears, Leaving Little Memory Of How It Really Felt. Life Aligns Behind The New Truth.

You Should Find Him Because He Loves You.

She Had Willed Her Heart To Stay Small And Contained, But It Wouldn’t Be. Oh, Well.

Love Is Like War; Easy To Begin, Hard To End.

It Wasn't Just That Lucy Wanted To Help Him. She Wasn't As Selfless As That. She Was Madly Attracted To Him. She Was Attracted To All Of The Normal Things And The Weird Things, Too, Like The Back Of His Neck And His Thumbs On The Edge Of His Desk And The Way His Hair Stuck Out On One Side Like A Little Wing Over His Ear. She Caught His Smell Once, And It Made Her Dizzy. She Couldn't Fall Asleep That Night.

She Liked The Life She Had. She Loved Habits. She Craved A Day With Nothing In It, A Long, Quiet Stretch Of Hours In The Studio.

But Like Everything Else, Love Changed.

I'm Afraid Of Time... I Mean, I'm Afraid Of Not Having Enough Time. Not Enough Time To Understand People, How They Really Are, Or To Be Understood Myself. I'm Afraid Of The Quick Judgements Or Mistakes Everybody Makes. You Can't Fix Them Without Time. I'm Afraid Of Seeing Snapshots, Not Movies.

It's So Much Easier To Have No Expectations Than To Have Big Ones.

She Was Sad About What Happened To Kostos. And Someplace Under That, She Was Sad That People Like Bee And Kostos, Who Had Lost Everything, Were Still Open To Love, And She, Who'd Lost Nothing, Was Not.

Lost Everything

Love Made You Admire Funny Things About A Person, Like How Good She Was At Remembering To Return Her Library Books And At Slicing Cucumbers Very Thin. She Was A Veritable Wonder At Pulling A Splinter Out Of Her Foot.

Sometimes You Couldn’t Face The Sadness Of Being Forgotten Until You Felt The Comfort Of Being Remembered Again.

When She Is Happy, She Can't Stop Talking, When She Is Sad She Doesn't Say A Word.

Maybe There Is More Truth In How You Feel Than In What Actually Happens.

I Want To Go Where You're Going. I'm Not Scared Of Dying. I Want To Stay Together And Come Back Together. You Said That Souls Cohere. I Want To Stay With You.

You Don't Have Time, Len. That Is The Most Bitter And The Most Beautiful Pieve Of Advice I Can Offer. If You Don't Have What You Want Now, You Don't Have What You Want. -pg276

I Love You, I'll Never Stop.

What Daniel Taketh Away, Daniel Giveth.

She Had To Have Faith Not Just In Trying But In Failing. Was She Strong Enough To Fail Was She Strong Enough Not To

You Couldn't Erase The Past. You Couldn't Even Change It. But Sometimes Life Offered You The Opportunity To Put It Right.

I Mean Putting Yourself Out There In The Way Of Overwhelming Happiness And Knowing You're Also Putting Yourself In The Way Of Terrible Harm. I'm Scared To Be This Happy. I'm Scared To Be This Extreme.

There Was One Thing Bridget Like About Guys. They Took Insults Well.

There Are Some People Who Fall In Love Over And Over.

Falling In Love

The Happiness At Getting What You Want Is Not Usually Commensurate With The Worry Leading Up To It.

Getting What You Want

I Don't Have The Life Of A Famous Person. But I Do Feel Like I've Been Able To Connect With A Lot Of People.

She Got Tired Of Herself. She Got Tired Of Not Being Able To Say What She Wanted Or Do What She Wanted Or Even Want What She Wanted.

Their Friendship Was Only One Aspect Of Their Lives But It Seemed To Give Meaning To All The Others.

Ruins Stood For What Was Lost, And Yet There Were Beautiful-peaceful, Historic, Intellectual. Not Tragic Or Regrettable. Lena Tried To Keep Hers That Way Too, And She Succeeded To Some Extent. Why Not Celebrate What You Had Rather Than Spend Your Time Mourning Its Passing? There Could Be Joy In Things That Ended.

Maybe It Didn’t Matter If You Were A World-famous Heartthrob Or A Painful Geek. Maybe It Didn’t Matter If You Friend Was Possibly Dying. Maybe You Just Got Through It. Maybe That Was All You Could Ask For.

They Were Here All At Once, But Not Together. Survival Took Self-absorption, And It Made Them Strangers With Nothing To Do And No Way To Relate. Emergencies Gave You A Shape And A Plot To Take Part In, While Death Was No Story At All. It Left You Nothing.

We Aren't In High School. We Aren't Really In Our Families And We Aren't In Our Houses. Those Are The Places We Grew Up And The Times We Spent Together, But They Aren't Us. If Think They Are, Then We're Lost, Because Times End And Places Are Lost. We Aren't Any Place Or Any Time . . . We Are Everywhere.

There Were Those Emotions Down There, And Though She Couldn't Quite Feel Them, They Were Strong And She Feared Them. It Was Like Watching A Thunderhead From High Up In A Plane, And Though You Weren't Under It, You Knew How It Would Feel If You Were. You Knew You'd Have To Land Eventually.

People Left A Lot Of Things Behind When They Went In The Water. Their Clothes, Their Stuff, Their Makeup, Their Fixed-up Hair, Their Voices, Their Hearing, Their Sight—at Least As The Normally Experienced Them.

Trending Author

Stanley Kubrick

Category