“Each period had required me to be a slightly different person, and that was exhausting. I wondered if school had always felt this way and whether it was like this for everone.”

“Though I hadn't had a stroke like Uncle Yuri, it was still difficult for me to express what was in my heart. I wanted to tell her that I loved her, that she was the most important person in the world to me, that I was truly sorry for having lied to her about Liberty. Instead, I asked her what she wanted for dinner.”

“Win walked over to me. He held out his palm. In the middle of it was a single black sequin from the dress Scarlet had lent me. "You lost this," he said.I giggled, slightly embarrassed to be leaving bits of myself behind. "I'm shedding.”

“My heart was a little bit broken, but I still had to go to school. I buttoned my dress shirt over it and my winter coat, too. I hoped it didn't show too much.”

“I wondered if the person who really loves you is the person who knows all your stories, the person who WANTS to know all your stories.”

“There is no difference in quality between a life lived forward and a life lived backwards, she thinks. She had come to love this backward life. It was, after all, the only life she had.”

“Despite what I said before, it had not been a fear of infecting other people or poor health that had stopped me from going, but vanity. It was a good lesson.”