Ingrid Law

“He looked at me screaming and plugging my ears and at the tears dripping like the kitchen tap down my cheeks; my words finally hit him, and he listened. Fish twisted sharply from me to Will Junior as though suddenly adding two and two and getting twenty-seven, even though most people could only ever get four.”

“Will looked back at me, startled, and I kept my heart muscle strong, feeling something inside me shiver like a pale green flower shoot just waking up for spring. But whatever that thing was, it was still too new to feel ready to bloom; it wanted time to set down roots. Someday soon I was going to bloom like crazy and then I'd have what I needed to keep me standing tall.”

“I'd grown used to all the voices inside of my head and knew which ones to pay attention to and which ones to ignore. The same went for all the voices outside of my head”

“When something like that comes along, whether it's an accident or a savvy or a very first kiss, life takes a turn and you can't step back. All you can do is keep moving forward and remember what you've learned.”

“I couldn't fathom it myself, but I guessed that happy endings came in all shapes and sizes.”

“I began to realize how hard it was to separate all the voices to hear the single, strong one that came just from me." —Mibs Beaumont”

“Why is it that adults are always telling kids to go watch television as though we have nothing better to do?”

“I suppose you can never tell right off who might have a piece of Prince Charming deep down inside.”

“If you use too much paint, you'll not only obscure your savvy completely, but most everything else in life will become dull and uninteresting for you too. You can't get rid of part of what makes you you and be happy...So a well-scumbled savvy gives you clarity and control...You have to let your own know-how, your own unique color, shine through as a something-special others can't quite put a finger on." —Momma”

“I wished that I...had no savvy at all. No savvy to cause me heartache. No savvy to make me hope, and then leave me useless.”

“Don't want to see any more...feel any more. Just let me fade away...I've seen too much...too much!”

“But as I grew up, I began to understand that a savvy is just a know-how of a different sort.”

“I was discovering that sometimes the outcome of a choice was almost as hard to predict or to control as a new savvy.”

“In most ways, Mibs, we Beaumonts are just like other people...We get born, and sometime later we die. And in between, we're happy and sad, we feel love and we feel fear, we eat and we sleep and we hurt like everyone else.—Momma”

“For better, worse or different, sometimes when things go back to normal, normal simply isn't normal anymore.”

“It can take a lot of strength to show up and be yourself...don't you think?”

“Some fears can be conquered...Others have a way of coming back around. Sometimes at the moment you least expect. Often with the very worst possible timing. Fear makes it hard to think. And when you can't think, it's hard to figure out your choices. When you can't see all your options, all you can do is react. —Uncle Autry”

“If only my savvy worked in reverse, I thought again- and not for the last time. If only I could draw a smiling sun on the back of my hand, then everyone around me could know exactly how I felt, exactly how happy I was at that perfect moment.”

“You never can tell when a bad thing might make a good thing happen.”

“You can't get rid of a part that makes you you and be happy.”