Brooke McKinley

“But so far their love had proved deeper than their doubts, their faith in each other more unshakeable than the fear.”

“Danny, whose body made Miller forget the world and whose soul, even marked with shadows, made Miller believe in something beyond the stars.”

“He didn’t know if his capacity to love had been stunted, buried beneath the need for survival for so long it had forgotten how to breathe....”

“This is the best, most real thing that’s ever happened to me,” Danny said quietly. “I’ve spent my whole life jumping from one bad choice to the next. Choosing this, with you, is probably the only decision I’ve ever been proud of making.” He pressed himself closer to Miller’s back, wrapping his arms around his waist. “I’ll never be sorry.”

“Who gets everything they want, Danny, exactly how they want it? You have to decide the most important thing and go from there.”

“It’s too late for that. It’s too late to go back,” Danny said, gentle but firm. “Now you have to decide the man you want to be from here on out.”

“It’s always our mistakes, the things we aren’t proud of, that are the first ones to stand up, ready to be counted. That’s human nature and it’s not going to change, not for me or for you, either.”

“finding what made you happy was only the beginning of the journey—figuring out how to keep it often proved to be the unreachable destination.”

“Something in the mysterious combination of Danny and him burned hotter and brighter than anything he'd ever imagined.”

“...and then Danny was moving on him in the rhythm they'd found so easily in the past, their bodies remembering the way of it as if they'd never been apart, as if they'd only been waiting to find each other again.”

“That's the best you can hope for, Danny. That your life turns out like that patchwork quilt. That you can add some bright, sparkling pieces to the dirty, stained ones you've got so far. That in the end, the bright patches might take up more space on your quilt than the dark ones.”

“You've had his dick in your hand and your tongue in his mouth and you can't sit down and eat a bowl of cereal with him ?”

“By letting go, Danny had freed him to pursue, had forced Miller to find the courage to follow.”

“Why," he panted into Danny's neck, "why's it so goddamn good?" He was surprised at how full his voice sounded, so close to overflowing its steady banks. Danny stroked his hair, his lips warm against Miller's cheek. "Because it's us, Miller," he whispered. "Because it's us.”

“You make me want to be a better man," Danny said. "You make me want to be worthy of you, Miller. But if that's ever going to stick, if it's ever going to be real, I have to do it for me. I can't do it just because its who you need me to be. It has to be who I need to be too.”

“It's like this old patchwork quilt my momma used to have...Each piece on that quilt meant something. And some of those pieces were the damn ugliest things you've ever seen...But some of the pieces were so beautiful they almost hurt my eyes to look at when I was a kid...That's the best you can hope for, Danny. That your life turns out like that patchwork quilt. That you can add some bright, sparkling pieces to the dirty, stained ones you have so far. That in the end, the bright patches might take up more space on your quilt than the dark ones.”

“Congratulations Danny. You're now the legal equivalent of a male nurse.”