“I realise now that I wanted to disappear. To get so lost that nobody ever found me. To go so far away that I'd never be able to make my way home again. But I have no idea why.”
“A person’s character, I realize, is never black-and-white. There is so much gray.”
“Teenagers, as everyone knows, tend to believe they are immortal.”
“Don’t say ‘sorry.’ Just cut it out.”
“Liz?"
"Hmmm?"
"Why do you care about me?"
The question seems to startle me. It's uncharacteristic for Richie, who is usually so cool and self-assured. I open my eyes. "Why would you ask me that?"
"Because I don't understand. We're so different."
I reach around the side of his face. Once again, I wipe fresh beads of sweat from his forehead. This time, I don't even bother wiping my hands on my pants. I lace my fingers into his again, and the two of us lie together, his damp clamminess seeping onto my made up face and my pretty clothes. Obviously, I couldn't care less.
"But we fit," I whisper. "Like this." And I tighten my grip around him.
"Mmm." He smiles, his eyes still closed.
"You're right. We do."
"Richie...I'm lying. I don't like you."
"You don't?" His voice cracks.
"No." I bring my lips close to his ear. "I love you Richie Wilson.”
“It occurs to me now that it isn't that I was always certain there was no truth to the rumor; it was that I didn't want to acknowledge the possibility there could be any truth to it.”
“He can't hear you." Alex sighs. "You aren't the sharpest sheep in the barn, are you?"
"That's not even the right metaphor," I snap, my attention still focused on Richie. "It's the sharpest pencil in the box."
"Right." Alex nods. "Except you are a sheep. I'm not stupid, I just adjusted the metaphor to fit your persona-"
"Oh, shut up. Richie!" I scream again. Alex shakes his head.”
“You know what my friends and I used to call girls like you? Girls who had everything handed to them on a silver platter, who only cared about how they looked and who was dating the most popular guy?"
"What?"
His grin grows wider. "We called you bitches. You girls were straight-up bitches.”
“There was never any question, not for either of us, that we'd stay together after high school. Richie Wilson was the love of my life.”
“Solo quiero que vivan su vida; que sigan adelante sabiendo que cada instante es valioso, que cada día es un regalo; que vean la vida como lo que es: una serie de infinitas posibilidades, no solo de grandes penas sino también de grandes alegrías.”
“Why should they bother to go grocery shopping? It's not like their son needs to eat or anything like that.”
“It’s like they don’t even know how to stand beside each other without one groping the other. Their clinginess has always annoyed me.”
“My favorite uncle was gay,” she says, “and he doesn’t like to dance, either.” She looks at Chad. “I don’t like that word. Fag. Don’t use it, okay?”
“just . . . I don’t like crying girls, okay?” We were quiet for a second while I took that in. “That was very nice of you, David,” I finally said. “Now hold on because I’m about to drive into a fence.”
“Admit nothing - that was his first rule. Appeal to logic - second rule. Delay the inevitable - third rule.”
“In increments both measurable and not, our childhood is stolen from us -- not always in one momentous event but often in a series of small robberies, which add up to the same loss.”
“It is well known that involuntary migrants, no matter what pot they are thrown into, tend not to melt.”
“Reed’s face inches closer to mine on the pillow as he says, “Let me try to explain something to you, Evie. All of these years that I have been here, it is as if I have been sleeping. I have to always pretend to be something that I am not—pretend to be human. When I am not pretending to be human, then I am hunting evil, vicious angels who want nothing more than to…” his voice trails off and there is hollowness in his tone that reflects the loneliness of his existence. “But now, I am awake, for the first time in my existence, and not only am I awake, but I feel flames when you are near me. You have changed things for me. There is no reason to pretend around you. If I had to live without you now…now that I know what I have been missing…” The need in his voice makes me want to promise him anything, give him anything, just to fill that void in him. “I cannot go back to sleep, Evie. You are the only thing that makes me want to live. If you leave here, if you ascend to Paradise, or even if you are cast into the abyss, or taken there by the Fallen…I will have to follow you, no matter where you go. Even if I have to pursue you into the dark…if you cease to be, then so will I. You are my sin and my redemption.”
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