"Strains of music spring up, crystallizing in the night air like rain turning suddenly to snow, drifting to earth."

"She knew that this day, this feeling, couldn't last forever. Everything passed; that was partly why it was so beautiful. Things would get difficult again. But that was okay too.The bravery was in moving forward, no matter what."

"You can't be happy unless you're unhappy sometimes"."

"Juliet!' I whip around but not quickly enough. She's swallowed by the crowd, the gap that allowed her to break for the door closing just as quickly as it opened, a shifting Tetris pattern of bodies..."

"I wish I could close my eyes and be blown into dust and nothingness, feel all my thoughts disperse like dandelion fluff drifting off on the wind."

"Could it be? Samantha Kingston? Home? On a Friday? I roll my eyes. "I don't know. Did you do a lot of acid in the sixties? Could be a flashback. "I was two years old in 1960. I came too late for the party. He leans down and pecks me on the head. I pull away out of habit. "And I'm not even going to ask how you know about acid flashbacks. "What's an acid flashback? Izzy crows. "Nothing, my dad and I say at the same time, and he smiles at me."

"Because I am terrified by what I want: for him, and worst of all, from him. Because I do want. I'm not even sure what, exactly, but the want is there, just like the hate and anger were there before. But this is not a tower. It is an endless, tunneling pit; it drives deep, and opens a hole inside me."

"It's kind of sad, if you think about it. Like there's no continuity in people at all. Like something ruptures when you hit twelve, or thirteen, or whatever the age is when you're no longer a kid but a "young adult, and after that you're a totally different person. Maybe even a less happy person. Maybe even a worse one."

"I'm dead, but I can't stop living."

"And you completely blow me away and rip my world up and everything else, and then you go back to ignoring me. "I blew you away? I squeak out before I can stop myself. He stares at me steadily. "You blew everything away."

"What's poetry?" I've never heard the word before, but I like the sound of it. It sounds elegant and easy, somehow, like a beautiful woman turning in a long dress."

"When you're completely free, you're also completely on your own."

"How is it possible, I think, to change so much and not be able to change anything at all?"