Abby Slovin

“Sparks fly everywhere, Parker. The world’s practically on fire. You need something more solid in your relationships than some silly little spark.”

“For the life of me, I don’t understand these bumper stickers. I would think, the more you believe in something, the less you’d want to stick it on your car. Just ridiculous the way people flaunt beliefs like they’re pocketbooks.”

“Her grandmother experienced them differently, as if they brought her remnants from another time, another life even, which she refused to acknowledge in any other context.”

“The streets were awash with blues and grays – suspended in the air, bouncing off buildings, reflecting off car windows – as Brooklyn neared nighttime.”

“Bodies bounced around like drunken particles.”

“The apartment was merely a collection of looted, hollowed out shades of paint.”

“Her letter bled from word to word, in three sour sentences.”

“Parker sat on the opposite end of the couch, distracted by thoughts of the coming year and all the secrets it kept from her.”

“She looked over at her grandmother, smiling in her sleep from what she hoped was a dream about George Bailey and the angel that would eventually save him.”

“Parker stared at the bare branches along Saint Marks Place as they swayed with the wind, reaching for one another, and longed for the warmth of a million little leaves and their multicolored smiles.”

“For a brief moment, the rusted steel beams above her sparkled like stars.”

“Her eyes watered until the moment became nothing more than floating colors in front of her watery eyes.”

“Grief can put all kinds of regret into focus.”

“She looked up and saw the right angles of time above her as the clock hit three.”

“It’s a leap of faith to think that being anonymous will change anything.”

“She smiled, not because she felt confident that she could think of a solution, but for the gratitude that she wasn’t quite so alone in her pursuit.”

“She kept public radio on so it sounded like someone was sitting next to her, engaging her in intriguing conversation.”

“The honesty of her plain skin was striking without foundation.”

“Old friends have a way of reminding you of what you used to be. In an instant, I remembered everything I once was and I realized how much I’d changed.”

“She looked up at me with a look that told me everything, gave me a glimpse of everything I would be missing in one instant.”

“She stood before him on the porch now, as living, breathing proof that fortune had not tipped itself in his direction all those years ago.”