“Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a battle you know nothing about.”
“If nothing ever changed, there would be no such things as butterflies.”
“The thing about leaving something behind for the last time is that you rarely realize you're doing it.”
“Sometimes the best things look the strangest.”
“Why do you like books so much?” he asked. Miles answered without taking his face away from the window. “You never know what you’ll learn when you open one. And if it’s a story, you sort of fall into it. Then you live there for a while, instead of, you know, living here.”
“Don't be too hard on him," Henry said, opening the door for Logan. "Perhaps he's insecure in this new environment." Logan nodded, although it seemed as if Philip had made himself right at home, bossing everyone around like he owned the place. He remembered the paper in his pocked and pulled it out: "Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a battle you know nothing about.”
“Logan didn't know what he'd been expecting to see- maybe some ground-up powder or specially aged cocoa beans from an exotic island. Instead, he saw their faces, full of anticipation, staring back up at him.”
“After all, they'd be busy for a while, they were Candymakers now, and they had a whole lotta candy to make.”
“Logan thought for a minute. "Well, if you enjoy life while you have it, then it doesn't matter how long you have it for. No one knows how long they get to live. It's like a deal you make when you're born, you know, to accept what happens to you."
"Is that what you do, just accept what happens?"
Logan shrugged. "I guess so. What else can you do?"
"Well, you can dwell on it and play it over in your head a hundred different ways."
Logan tilted his head. "Does that help?"
Miles sighed. "No.”
“Paulo plugged in the machine, which looked like the mutant offspring of a vacuum cleaner and a toaster oven, and showed them how to place wood chips in the bottom. Then he lit the wood chips with a long match and aimed the metal contraption at the opening of the hive. Puffs of smoke wafted around the hive and then blew straight in. Almost immediately the bees, which had been flying haphazardly around the room, raced back to the hive, and the buzzing inside grew louder and louder.”
“!” “Wow,” Miles said in mock sincerity. “That really does sound like a good part!” Daisy kicked him playfully in the shin. “C’mon,” Logan said, taking Miles by the arm. “Let’s let her read in peace. We only have a few minutes.” Miles made a big show of rubbing his shin as they left. Logan led the way to the far corner of the field, where the milkweed, clover, and marigolds grew. He tiptoed to the white clover bush and knelt in front of it. “He’s still there,” Logan whispered, pointing to the underside of a leaf. The caterpillar’s chrysalis hung by the thinnest of threads, like a silver strand of spun sugar. Logan had rigged up a temporary shelter for it out of some twigs and gauze. That way, if it rained or a big wind kicked up, it should be protected. He tested the twigs to make sure they were still sturdy, then took out his pencil and notebook, flipping quickly to the chart on the last page. He wanted to make sure Miles didn’t see his drawings. Not because they were bad—he freely admitted they were—but because most of them”
“Max clapped his hands. “Go, go, go!”
“She watched as the chocolate looped through the tubes, then flowed along a flat surface until it cascaded over the edge, creating a chocolate waterfall so smooth and shiny she could see her reflection in it. The”
“What is it?” Philip said. “I’m creating a work of confectionary art here.” “Well,”
“Dwelling. Miles repeated the word to himself. It was a strange word.”
“The towering stacks of profiteroles, the mille-feuille and champagne creams were banished in favor of the sweet and the simple; pans of clafoutis with preserved cherries, slices of tarte tatin and cups of hot chocolate.”
“It was the hour of morning,
when the sun mounts with those stars
that shone with it when God's own love
first set in motion those fair things”
“When the middle classes get passionate about politics, they're arguing about their treats—their tax breaks and their investments. When the poor get passionate about politics, they're fighting for their lives.
Politics will always mean more to the poor. Always. That's why we strike and march, and despair when our young say they won't vote. That's why the poor are seen as more vital, more animalistic. No classical music for us—no walking around National Trust properties or buying reclaimed flooring. We don't have nostalgia. We don't do yesterday. We can't bear it. We don't want to be reminded of our past, because it was awful: dying in means, and slums, without literacy, or the vote. Without dignity. It was all so desperate then. That's why the present and the future is for the poor—that's the place in time for us: surviving now, hoping for better later. We live now—for our instant, hot, fast treats, to pep us up: sugar, a cigarette, a new fast song on the radio.
You must never, never forget when you talk to someone poor, that it takes ten times the effort to get anywhere from a bad post code. It's a miracle when someone from a bad post code gets anywhere, son. A miracle they do anything at all.”
“There will be boys who will tell you you're beautiful, but only a few will see you.”
“Sometimes he wished he didn’t have a sister, though he loved Deenie and still remembered the feeling he had when he caught that kid Ethan pushing her off the swing set in the school yard in fifth grade. And how time seemed to speed up until he was shoving the kid into the fence and tearing his jacket. The admiring look his sister gave him after, the way his parents pretended to be mad at him but he could tell they weren’t.
These days, it was pretty different. There’d be those moments he was forced to think about her not just as Deenie but as the girl whose slender tank tops hung over the shower curtain. Like bright streamers, like the flair the cheerleaders threw at games.
Sometimes he wished he didn’t have a sister.”
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