Courtney Summers

“I think some girls are just fucked up.”

“I was perfect... and then I wasn't.”

“Hey, let’s give her some space. Get back to the game, guys,” Chris says. Thank God for him, just this once. “And cheerleading. Get back to that, too.” No one moves. “Okay, fuck off, basically, is what I’m saying. Fuck off!”

“Time passes too quickly when you're getting ready to do something you don't want to do.”

“I wonder if, even after all of this, he understands how fragile good things are in my hands and how many times they've been taken away from me.”

“You only get to walk variations of the same lines everyone has already drawn for you.”

“Tell Liz,' I say, 'the mean girl totally got what she deserved in the end.”

“Yeah, totally. I punch myself in the arms a lot. It's a real problem.”

“Write it down today, put it away, make sense of it tomorrow.”

“I'm not afraid to be alone like you are.”

“I don't like you with Becky. She's not a very nice girl.''I don't like you with Jake. He's not me.”

“Becky, you're only standing there because I decided I didn't want to.”

“Yeah, sure,” I say, and then, for good measure: “Whatever.”

“We were beyond needing other people. Anyone else who happens on the both of us, they're just temps.”

“You're not responsible for everything, Parker. You can't control the way things end up. Stop trying.”

“I elbow my way through the mass of people to get to my locker because there's something immensely satisfying about the toughest part of my arm connecting with the softest part of everyone else.”

“Cardboard cutouts of cheerleaders operated by arthritic monkeys would move more fluidly.”

“The problem with alienating, self-destructive behavior is people get it into their heads it’s a cry for help. It wasn’t.”

“Whatever's between us is that kind of new.”

“I hate that I'm so numb and empty and disconnected from most of these people but even I can see worth in stupid little moments like these. These people aren't even my family, but I can see their value and if I can see it in something this small, when I feel this bad, then---Then why didn't he?”

“Imagine 4 years.Four years, two suicides, one death, one rape, two pregnancies (one abortion), three overdoses, countless drunken antics, pantsings, spilled food, theft, fights, broken limbs, turf wars–every day, a turf war–six months until graduation and no one gets a medal when they get out. But everything you do here counts. High school.”

“Like being alive one moment and dead the next.”

“Eddie, I think... sometimes lies bring you to the truth... or help you reconcile with it...”

“No, you're a work of art.”

“I'm always leaving, but I never have anywhere to go.”

“Sometimes I feel hunted by my grief. It circles me, stalks me. It's always in my periphery. Sometimes I can fake it out. Sometimes I make myself go so still, it can't sense that I'm there anymore and it goes away. I do that right now.”

“So? You have a boy's name.""And you have a dog's name.”

“Then I should be dead really soon, because you're stressing me out.”

“Like I'd let you captain me.”

“When he sees me, he stops.His eyes widen, his face pales.And then before i can say anything, he's holding me.And the worst part is-I want to hold him.But I also want to slap him, hit him. Punch him. Tear out his throat.I want him to tell me what he did to me was a mistake. Some horrible mix-up. . .after I'm done holding him back.”

“I'm hazy on remembering or maybe I'm just tired or maybe a part of my brain wants to sabotage me.”

“Why. Why. Why. WHY.The question my life had become.”

“Eddie, It's like you died that night," he whispers.So that's it. I died.I've been dead.I blink back the tears and pick at the mattress, but I don't say anything. I don't know what I could say to him. I don't know how to convince him I'm still here when I'm not sure of it myself anymore.”

“My hands are dying.”

“Don't divide me into before and after.”

“You make me feel alone.”

“I hear the unmistakable sound of glass breaking and I start apologizing to no one, trying to pick it up again, but I can't. I can't get my hands to work because they're too cold.”

“When I found my dad, I knew things were going to change forever, but sitting next to her, getting ready to see my dad buried, I felt it in a different way. Everything ached.This reminds me of that - how it aches.But it's a better ache, too.I'm hopeful.I can't remember the last time I felt hopeful.”

“I close my eyes and think of the photograph Culler showed me. I see it in my head perfectly. He'll be there, at that school. Another piece of my father. And then another. Six pieces. I will find them all, put them together. I'll find him.And then I'll let him go.”

“This is awful. This is so hopeless. We're all lost in different ways, so how do we even help each other find our way out. We won't. We can't. We'll just stay lost forever.”

“Milo and I have this drinking game about Beth: every time she annoys me, we drink.She annoys me alot.”

“I'm struck by how amazing it is and how sad that makes me, because I've never seen that. He's not like that around me. The way his mouth quirks and lights up his eyes. He should smile more often. It's so innocent.”

“Jake and Chris talk through art and discover they have so much in common it's amazing. Like, They Could Be Boyfriends If They Didn't Like Vaginas So Much Amazing. ”

“A whole world exists outside of that hellhole.”

“...We’re working with paint today and I pick the easel next to Jake’s. It thrills him.“What do you want?”“I want to apologize if you’re offended by the way I am,” I tell him. “But that’s the way I am with everyone. I was just trying to make you feel welcome.”“That’s the crappiest apology I’ve ever heard.”“Well, that’s because I’m not really sorry.”He rolls his eyes. “Right.”

“The sooner you make a mistake and learn to live with it, the better. You're not responsible for everything. You can't control the way things end up.”

“I mean, you know how it is. You chase a bottle of sleeping pills with a bottle of Jack Daniel's and life's never the same, no matter how many times you try to tell people it was just an accident.”

“How does it feel to know that even at my worst, you're still not good enough?”

“I didn't want to be popular because it was easier; I wanted to be popular because in high school that's the best thing you can be: perfect. Everything else is shit.”

“If I can do things right, I don't see why everyone else can't.”