Quotes from First & Then

Emma Mills ·  272 pages

Rating: (10.3K votes)


“A thousand electric cars could run on how you feel when you know that the person you like likes you back. It feels incredible. Like it shouldn't be possible. Of all the happy coincidences to ever exist, it's one of the happiest.”
― Emma Mills, quote from First & Then


“When you love something, you can't be happy all the time, can you? Like, that's why you love it. It makes you feel all kinds of things, not just happy. It can hurt, it can make you fucking mad, but... it makes you feel something, you know?”
― Emma Mills, quote from First & Then


“As far as I was concerned, physical education was evil. You take a bunch of teenagers, make them strip down in front of each other in a locker room, have them don hideous matching uniforms, and then measure their worth based on their ability to chuck balls at a net, into a hoop, or at each other. It was just. Evil.”
― Emma Mills, quote from First & Then


“Close your eyes, real tight, and then count to three hundred. That’s all you have to do. You just count to three hundred, and when you open your eyes, five minutes will have passed. And even if it hurts or things are shitty or you don’t know what to do, you just made it through five whole minutes. And when it feels like you can’t go on, you just close your eyes and do it again. That’s all you need. Just five minutes at a time.”
― Emma Mills, quote from First & Then


“I pulled out my phone and thought about calling someone, but who was there to call? And what would I even say? It was just the kind of unpleasant surprise you had to share with someone, but I didn’t have anybody to share it with.”
― Emma Mills, quote from First & Then



“I had also never realized before that I loved him, but I did. And his pain was my pain, and it hurt, but it also felt good in a strange way, knowing that we could share in it together.”
― Emma Mills, quote from First & Then


“But there was something in his eyes at times that I would almost swear said something more. Some deeper sort of regard.”
― Emma Mills, quote from First & Then


“Labor Day is really the last sweet taste of summer. One final pardon before all your Mondays become Mondays again.”
― Emma Mills, quote from First & Then


“Wait,” he said, and he had his hand outstretched toward me, fingertips just brushing the sleeve of my sweatshirt, gently rooting me to the spot. I wanted to shrug him off, but at the same time, I wanted to fall against him and bury my face in his shoulder. I wanted to commiserate about what had just happened, and make sure he was okay, and discuss how Stanton really is psychotic. I did none of the above.”
― Emma Mills, quote from First & Then


“The idea that it doesn't matter what over people think about you gets thrown around a lot in high school, and in many instances it's true. But I do care what certain people think of me.”
― Emma Mills, quote from First & Then



“It could have been avoided. This couch misery spiral, this … loss … I could’ve avoided the bulk of it simply by doing more. I could’ve given a shit...”
― Emma Mills, quote from First & Then


About the author

Popular quotes

“It’s in that second that I realize my front door is open, and then Logan charges across the room like a bull and hits Trip in the side, tumbling with him to the floor. “Logan!” I cry, tugging on his shoulder. He has his hands around Trip’s throat and noises are coming from his mouth that I don’t understand. I’ve never seen him this angry, but apparently intense emotion affects his speech. Trip grunts from beneath him, and I see what’s going to happen before it ever does. Trip reaches for an urn that’s on the floor by the couch, and he picks it up to hit Logan over the head with it. It bounces off his back, though, and just tumbles to the floor. It’s plastic, so I don’t know what Trip thought he was going to do with it. “Let him up, Logan,” I say, getting my face down near his. “Let him up. He’s drunk.” He doesn’t let him up, though. He keeps his knee on Trip’s chest. He’s not hurting him, but he’s holding him there. “What the fuck was he doing to you that made you slap him?” he asks. “He’s drunk. Let him up so he can go to bed.” Logan takes his thumbs off Trip’s windpipe, and Trip draws in a huge gulp of air. “Call the cops, Emily,” Trip starts screaming. Logan tightens his grip again. “He has to shut the fuck up if he wants me to let him up.” He looks down at Trip. “I hate a fucking drunk,” he says. “I’m going to let you up, and you’re going to go to your room. Do you understand?” Trip nods. Logan steps back, and Trip scrambles to his feet, nearly falling over in the process. “I should call the cops.” “So I can tell them how you were assaulting me?” I ask. He looks confused. “I just wanted to kiss you,” he whines. He’s not pretty when he drinks. Not at all. I shake my head. “But I didn’t want to be kissed.” I blow out a huge breath. I feel as though someone pulled the stopper on a big balloon inside me. “Go to bed, Trip. We’ll talk tomorrow.” Trip nods, unsteady on his feet. He goes into his room and closes the door.”
― quote from Smart, Sexy and Secretive


“I thought I was pretty damn clever. She said that was all right, she’d make three wishes. The first was that I wouldn’t piss this money away being an idiot and forgetting I had”
― Nora Roberts, quote from High Noon


“For way down there, in a shot glass's false bottom, everything was bound to turn out fine after all.”
― Nelson Algren, quote from The Man With the Golden Arm


“That is the answer to the question which is always being asked: why has
the revolutionary movement identified itself with materialism rather than with idealism? Because to
conquer God, to make Him a slave, amounts to abolishing the transcendence that kept the former masters
in power and to preparing, with the ascendancy of the new tyrants, the advent of the man-king. When
poverty is abolished, when the contradictions of history are resolved, "the real god, the human god, will
be the State." Then homo homini lupus becomes homo homini deus. This concept is at the root of the
contemporary world.”
― Albert Camus, quote from The Rebel: An Essay on Man in Revolt


“I like money on the wall. Say you were going to buy a $200,000 painting. I think you should take that money, tie it up, and hang it on the wall. Then when someone visited you the first thing they would see is the money on the wall.”
― Andy Warhol, quote from The Philosophy of Andy Warhol (From A to B and Back Again)


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