Liz Reinhardt

“So you like me because I can think like a rebel, but I act like a good girl?”

“Why don't you wear those tiny shorts when you run, like they do in the movies?" His voice was low and sexy, and he knew it."Because I'm not in a movie. I know it's confusing, since you obviously live 'The Saxon Show' day and night, but some of us want to live a boring, old, normal high school life, you know?”

“Love is hard. It's forgiving your best friend when you want to shove her away.”

“I love you. I love you. And I know you didn't ask yet and don't have a ring and don't know when this will all happen, but my answer is definitely 'yes.”

“And then I save up for a ring and ask you to marry me. And then, if everything goes the way I want, you agree. And then whatever you want. As long as you're with me, I know things will be alright”

“How can I miss someone so badly when we're in the same room?”

“Tell me. Tell me why you think you're leaving me again. Because you're not, you know. You're not leaving without me”

“I don't deserve you”

“I've loved one girl. That's you, Evan Lennox”

“It would be a bad thing because I'm afraid to gamble with your heart, Evan. I'm afraid to hurt you.”

“You deserve better that what I've given you”

“Hey beautiful. You have a minute for me?”

“You make me believe in a lot of things I never thought I would”

“I wanted to call you. See you. You have no idea how bad I wanted to”

“I don’t think you realise how much you like him Brenna. I think it’s ridiculous and irritating, especially considering what you could have right here, but I’m not judging.”

“There are things I want, too. Things I want to change. I’m tired of only being there for a good time, Brenna. I’m tired of being a corrupter of the people I love. I no one wants to be the perpetual fuck up.”

“I’m fucked up,” he admitted. “But I could be better than I am. With you, I know I could be. Give me half a chance,” he pleaded.”

“Forget all of our past bullshit, okay? I’ve got less than a handful of days to convince you that I’m not a complete douche bag, and I want a fair shot. Give it to me.”

“I wanted this to be easy. I wanted to know for sure who I loved and why. I wanted to be in love without a hint of doubt.But I realised that I could want as hard as I liked; the reality was already messier than I liked. I was in over my head … and I had a panicked feeling that I wasn’t going to be able to manoeuvre this without screwing up big time.”

“I swear to you, I will rip this world and every other one apart to get to you if you need me.”

“His mouth closes in on mine, and that single second before our lips meet spins out for eternity. And it makes graphs and flow-charts and PowerPoints underlining all the reasons we should absolutely not be doing this.But we are.We so completely are.Winch walks me back to the bed and lies me down, his entire body pressed long and perfectly weighted over mine. He kisses me with a gentle, coaxing pressure for a few minutes, like he's taking my temperature, gauging my heart rate, and determining if I'm in.I'm all in.”

“He's the path lined with wildflowers, And I'm Red Riding Hood. I've been warned, but I just can't resist the blossom and perfume that calls me over.”

“Now my heart is desperate in my chest, like a bird crashing into a window over and over again, confused that it can't get to what it sees and wants, and willing to kill itself in the attempt to remedy that.”

“You're welcome, ma'am."My head whips up at the ma'am.Not that I haven't heard that word spilled like sticky sweet syrup from a thousand mouths of a thousand boys who've been born and bred to use it everyday.There's something about this boy, the way that word just slides off his tongue, buoyed with cautious respect and elegant pleasure.Like he loves saying the word.Like his lips weigh the worth of it.”

“I hand over some files to and her eyes meet mine, all cool and sweet like a snow-cone in July.”

“You’ve fought for me. You’ve challenged me. You’ve begged me and left me and come back to me”

“He’s kissing like he doesn’t have a minute to waste, like I’ll evaporate under his hands if he doesn’t keep pace.”

“To hold you. To smell your hair and hope you don’t notice and think I’m some sort of psychotic. To watch the way the light moves over your skin. I want you to get chilly and sleepy and need to press your body tight to mine, and I want to wrap my arms around you. I want whatever you write in that secret book of yours about me to be worth all the other rotten shit you’re going to wind up accepting down the line.”

“You run away for freedom. You run away because you can’t be trapped by the people who love you but don’t understand you. You run away because you want to be missed, you want them to start a worried search party combing far and wide for any scrap of evidence that you’re going to be back, safe and sound. Running away is a way to play a dirty trick on the perfect fate that will suffocate you if you’re not careful.”

“It’s about how love can be so complicated and huge and beautiful, and how there’s enough of it for everyone we ever meet.”

“I'll spend the rest of my life falling as far and deep and hard as my heart will let me go in love with this perfect, crazy girl who taught me to let go and hold on. I know in that minute I'll be Evan's fall guy until the day I die, and my future, for the first time in my life, is an always I can't wait to fall into.”

“That I love her, that I want her, that I'm never going anywhere, that she and I are going to last. That this is real. That it’s forever.”

“So I get ready to let go and free-fall in the scariest jump of my life. But she's with me. So I swallow my fear and do it.”

“You're the fall guy, Winch. You're the guy they come to when no one else will stand up and take their medicine. And they come to you because you never make them stand up and take it.”

“What he doesn't realize is that I'm already standing at the bottom, waiting to catch him. And I never miss.”

“Darling, family can be the very devil in disguise. More powerful than any drug, more alluring than any sin. They can demand a loyalty that will rip your heart out and chew it up without the thought of an apology.”

“Sometimes is all we really have anyway, right? Nothing is always.”

“Dresses that are complicated," she says softly, the smile on her lips pure wicked fun, "are essential to teach girls that they shouldn't bother with guys who won't figure out how to take off a dress.”

“I will never break your heart. I will never hurt you. I might fuck up, I might not be perfect, but I'll never hurt you, Evan. You have my word.”

“We met in court. I don't think we qualify as good decision makers.”

“I'm powerless against a bad boy and his hot kisses.”

“I could never hurt you as bad as you try to hurt yourself,”

“I don’t want to be your God damn friend”

“Was she someone special?” I hoped it might be for a lot of reasons.“Yeah, Bren. I proposed to her right after she let me feel her up in someone’s parent’s bathroom at a house party. It was magical.”

“It’s not just a damn game. Whatever it is that I feel for you is more real than anything I’ve ever felt before.”

“I should haven’t gotten all self-righteous on you. If you want to strip on a pole… well, I’ll stand guard with a gun, but I’ll support you.”

“You’re deceptively good, Blix. Just the perfect amount of bitch to be sexy.”

“I fell again, head over heels, uncontrollably and without a chance to grab hold before it swallowed me hard and whole.”

“Just you and me. That's all, Jake. I know it might not be perfect. I don't want or expect perfect. I just want you.”

“So I knew this wasn't going to be one of those things where I liked a guy and then this awful girl liked him, and I got the guy because I was so wholesome and right and good. This was real life. In real life, I had to get a serious grip.”