The Guest List

In my experience, those who have the greatest respect for the rules also take the most enjoyment in breaking them.

And I'm not worried about it being haunted. I have my own ghosts. I carry them with me wherever I go.

But no matter what happens, life is only a series of days. You can’t control more than a single day.

But that’s nostalgia for you, the tyranny of those memories of childhood that feel so golden, so perfect.

Just because the rest of us don’t wear our hearts on our sleeves, just because we have found a way of managing our feelings – it doesn’t mean they’re not there.

Marriage is about finding that person you know best in the world. Not how they take their coffee or what their favourite film is or the name of their first cat. It's knowing on a deeper level. It's knowing their soul.

The rage is growing inside me, overtaking the shock and grief. I can feel it blossoming up behind my ribs. It’s almost a relief, how it obliterates every other feeling in its path.

It's always better to get it out in the open - even if it seems shameful, even if you feel like people won't understand.

If I could cry it might all be better, but I can’t. It’s like an ability I’ve lost, like a language I’ve forgotten.

When he broke up with me, he told me that he would love me forever. But that’s total crap. If you love someone, really, you don’t do anything to hurt them.

You don't get this. This isn't your moment. You didn't create it. I created it in spite of you.

Sometimes,’ I say, ‘I think it’s too difficult to tell the people closest to you. The ones you love.

If I didn't pay attention, one of those currents could grow into a huge riptide, destroying all my careful planning. And here's another thing I've learned - sometimes the smallest currents are the strongest.

Nowhere on earth could possibly live up to those halcyon days. But that’s nostalgia for you, the tyranny of those memories of childhood that feel so golden, so perfect.

But it’s possible to hate your body when you’re thin, too. To feel like it’s kept secrets from you. To feel like it’s let you down.

None of us had realized quite how fragile Alice was. She had always seemed so capable, so in control: getting all those amazing grades, playing on the sports teams, getting her place at university, never missing a trick. But underneath that, fuelling all this success, was a tangled mass of anxiety that none of us saw until it was too late.

It’s always better to get it out in the open - even if it feels shameful, even if you feel like people will judge you for it.

When you've got your heart set on someone Brad Pitt could walk in and he wouldn't be enough--" "Brad Pitt is really fucking old," I say. "Um--Harry Styles?" That almost makes me smile. "Yeah. Maybe. or Timothee Chalamet.

There's another self that I sometimes feel I lost along the way. The girl who always stayed for one more drink, who loved a dance. I miss her, sometimes.

See, mine is a profession in which you orchestrate happiness....You can't control more than a single day. But you can control one of them. Twenty four hours can be curated. A wedding day is a neat little parcel of time in which I can create something whole and perfect to be cherished for a lifetime, a pearl from a broken necklace.

But it’s all about the moment, a wedding. All about the day. It’s not really about the marriage at all, in spite of what everyone says.

There's nothing less sexy than a lack of ambition, is there?

I want to tell her to wipe off the lipstick and eyeliner, to stay in that safe childhood space for a while longer.

When I step outside the sun is just beginning to go down, spilling fire upon water. It tinges pink the mist that has begun to gather over the bog, that shields its secrets. This is my favourite hour.

the worst thing I could imagine was her being taken from me.

If doing your own make-up is good enough for Kate Middleton, it’s good enough for me.

life is only a series of days. You can’t control more than a single day.

something dark and cruel hiding behind the public schoolboy manners.

It's always like the first time with him - that haste, only better, now we know exactly what the other wants.

a storm is raging. It shrieks around them, it batters the marquee.