“that feeling that I could touch the sky? That’s exactly how you make me feel.” (Ray)”
“Sometimes you have to make choices, and they're imperfect, but they're the only choices you can make and live with yourself.”
“I rested my hand on hers. Actually, when I wasn’t paying attention, it was in hers. I don’t know if it helped. I don’t know if it made any difference at all, if she had even the vaguest sense that I was there, that I was thinking about her and hurting for her and praying for her. All I could do was try. All I could do was be here. All I could give her was my love, even if she never knew.”
“Sometimes, I think... people we put on pedestals... they've got that much further to fall when you realize they're human.”
“It wasn’t. Ray was too alive, too vital, too much of everything. Everything about him was real, solid. He couldn’t be these things the doctor described. Not breathing on his own. No brain activity. Not Ray.
“I don’t have home without him”, Carrie said when doctor asked her to go home.
“I won’t give up on him. Do you hear me, Doctor? Don’t you give up on him!”
“Small moment, missed opportunities, things we don't see or pay attention to at the time sometimes have a far bigger impact on our lives than we would have ever guessed in advance.”
“I’ll go to hell with him”
“I don’t have home without him”, Carrie said when doctor asked her to go home.
“I won’t give up on him. Do you hear me, Doctor? Don’t you give up on him!”
“Someday you going to make some man very happy
I hope its going to be Ray...
Your soldier? I nodded, a half smile in my face
You love him?
Yes....Yes I do...”
“Next time we meet again, let’s play doctor”
“Life is fragile. Screw all that hesitant bullshit. We were going to go for it.”
“She stopped, then finally turned around, and looked at me. “Just because you’ve been in a war doesn’t mean you’ve got a monopoly on shitty situations. And this is a shitty situation. So back to what I said before. Don’t tell me what to do.”(Sarah)”
“Anger gone as quick as it had come, now I just felt like an idiot. Not that this was the first time, and probably wouldn’t be the last. (Ray)”
“I love you, Carrie," he whispered between shuddering breaths.
"Forever," I whispered.”
“Ray... I don't know if you can hear me. I don't know if you're in there. But you need to know... that I love you. I love you, and I want you home with me. Please come back, Ray. Please wake up.”
“people we put on pedestals ... they’ve just got that much further to fall when you realize they’re human”
“And if I can’t?” He held up the rope. There was a handle attached to the end. “Do you know what this is?” I did not reply. “It’s a Punjab lasso,” he said as if beginning a lecture. “The Thuggees used it. They were known as the silent assassins. From India. Some people think they were all wiped out in the nineteenth century. Others, well, others are not so sure.” He looked at Katy and held the primitive weapon up high. “Need I go on here, Will?” I shook my head. “He’ll know it’s a trap,” he said.”
“We give all we have, lives, property, safety, skill...we fight, we die, for a simple thing. Only that a man can stand up.”
“But now, as autumn approached with an occasional cold day warning of winter, he began to ponder seriously the matter of establishing contact with whatever tribes inhabited this area. All he knew of them were the legends of his youth: Below us at the end of our river is a larger river, much larger. On the west are the Potomacs, mighty in battle, but on the east there is no one of consequence. If they live on rivers like this, Pentaquod thought, they are of consequence. Then he reflected on what this meant; they were certainly not of any importance to the Susquehannocks, for they had neither trade goods to be envied nor war canoes to fear. No doubt the Potomacs, who had both, had the same low opinion of the easterners. But what did the easterners think of themselves? What did Pentaquod, living gently as an easterner, think of himself? It is so much easier here.”
“For a week I did not take off my mechanic's coverall day or night I did not bathe or shave or brush my teeth because love taught me too late that you groom yourself for someone you dress and perfume yourself for someone and I'd never had anyone to do that for.”
“Too many people, when listing all the perils to be found in the search for lost treasure or ancient wisdom, had forgotten to put at the top of the list "the man who arrived just before you".”
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