Ned Vizzini

“Of course I wasn't abused. If I were; things would be so simple. I'd have a reason to for being in a shrinks office. I'd have a justification and something to work on. The world wasn't going to give me something that tidy.”

“I'm going to be here until I'm cured?""Life is not cured, Mr. Gilner. Life is managed".”

“Hold on a second. I can talk,' I say. 'Guys.' I look at all three of them in turn. 'One thing that they do in here is give you a lot of time to think. I can't explain it; once you come in, time just slows down-''Well, you don't have any interruptions, that's probably it-''Also I think the clocks are a little off-'I wave my hand. 'Point is, you have time to think about how you got here...”

“Up next is Noelle.'Hey, girl!''Don't you dare start calling me that. This is very nice of you to do.”

“Life can't be cured, but it can be managed.”

“It’s tough to get out of bed; I know that myself. You can lie there for an hour and a half without thinking anything, just worrying about what the day holds and knowing that you won’t be able to deal with it.”

“Dr. Barney stared at me, his lips puckered. What was he so serious about? Who hasn’t thought about killing themselves, as a kid? How can you grow up in this world and not think about it?”

“We came up to the first tower of the bridge, with a plaque proclaiming who had built it; I stopped to read. John Roebling. Aided by his wife, and then his son. He died during construction. But hey, the Brooklyn Bridge might be here for eight hundred years. I wanted to leave something like that behind. I didn’t know how I was going to do it, but I felt like I had taken the first steps”

“I'm glad you came here and got the help you needed," Neil says, and he shakes my hand in that way that people do in here to remind themselves that you're the patient and they're the doctor/volunteer/ employee. They like you, and they genuinely want you to do better, but when they shake your hand you feel that distance, that slight disconnect because they know that you're still broken somewhere, that you might snap at any moment.”

“Dad nods, looks me dead in the eyes; slowly and regretfully, he banishes all the smiling and joking from his face, and for once he's just my dad, watching his son who has fallen so low.”

“We tend to have things a little bit easier than girls. And we tend to assume therefore that the world was built for us, and that we’re, you know, the culmination of everything that came before us. And then we get told that having a little bit of this attitude is called balls, and that balls are good, and we kind of take it from there”

“I'm not afraid of dying, I'm afraid of living.”

“And when you say the truth you get stronger.”

“I like you a lot. Because you’re funny and smart and because you seem to like me. I know that’s not a good reason, but I can’t help it; if a girl likes me I tend to like her back [...] I like you for all this stuff but I also kind of like you for the cuts on your face—”

“...never touching, never talking, just smiling and keeping our eyes locked.”

“But some people have to get lucky just to live. And I never knew I could make anybody lucky.”

“My one friend is a screwup—a genius blessed with the most beautiful girl in the world, and he doesn’t even know it.”

“I had hurt her feelings, I found out later; I didn’t know I had that power.”

“I owe her everything and I love her and I tell her these days, although every time I say it, it gets a little diluted. I think you run out of I love yous.”

“I'm still a nobody, when am I not going to be a nobody?”

“It's when people compliment you that you're in trouble. That means they expect you to keep it up.”

“If there is a next life, I hope it's in the past; I don't think the future will be any more handleable.I think it's a little harsh how the END button is red.”

“I didn't want to be part of some trend. I wasn't doing this for a fashion statement”

“Some of the most profound truths about us are things that we stop saying in the middle.”

“I jumped in the mosh pit, and some kid punched me in the chin, so I swung on ceiling pipes and kicked people in the head.”

“Life is not cured, Mr. Gilner." Dr. Mahmoud leans in. "Life is managed.”

“People don't make good Anchors, though, Craig. They change.”

“Where are you supposed to put your arms when you dance? It’s like the Universal Question.”

“Noelle: But I look like a freak now.Craig: I told you, Noelle, everybody has problems. Some people just hide their crap better than others. But people aren’t going to look at you and run away. They’re going to look at you and think that they can talk to you, and that you’ll understand, and that you’re brave, and that you’re strong. And you are. You’re brave and strong. p.366-367”

“I was never big on rage.' 'Why?' "It's so much more angry in my head than it could ever be outside.”

“Relationships change even more than people. It's like two people changing. It's exponentially more volatile. Especially two teenagers.”

“A working brain is probably a lot like a map, where anybody can get from one place to another on the freeways. It's the nonworking brains that get blocked, that have dead ends, that are under construction like mine.”

“Nobody had told me I was common.”

“pro scienta atque sapienta-Latin- for science and wisdomIt's a Darwinian popularity contest. at all times, the question on everyone's mind is, "who's coolest?" Do you want the Spanish Inquisition in here? you better start acting with a little sobriety, or your mother is going to put two and two together”

“deep down I believe my year was a special year: it produced me.”

“It’s a huge thing, this Shift, just as big as I imagined. My brain doesn’t want to think anymore; all of a sudden it wants to do.”

“I’m not better, you know. The weight hasn’t left my head. I feel how easily I could fall back into it, lie down and not eat, waste my time and curse wasting my time, look at my homework and freak out and go and chill at Aaron’s, look at Nia and be jealous again, take the subway home and hope that it has an accident, go and get my bike and head to the Brooklyn Bridge. All of that is still there. The only thing is, it’s not an option now. It’s just… a possibility, like it’s a possibility that I could turn to dust in the next instant and be disseminated throughout the universe as an omniscient consciousness. It’s not a very likely possibility.”

“This was all an excuse, I think. I was doing fine. I had a 93 average and I was holding my head above water. I had good friends and a loving family. And because I needed to be the center of attention, because I needed something more, I ended up here, wallowing in myself, trying to convince everybody around me that I have some kind of. . . disease. I don’t have any disease. I keep pacing. Depression isn’t a disease. It’s a pretext for being a prima donna. Everybody knows that. My friends know it; my principal knows it. The sweating has started again. I can feel the Cycling roaring up in my brain. I haven’t done anything right. What have I done, made a bunch of little pictures? That doesn’t count as anything. I’m finished. My principal just called me and I hung up on him and didn’t call back. I’m finished. I’m expelled. I’m finished.”

“You want to play video games twenty-four hours a day?""Or watch. I just want to not be me. Whether it's sleeping or playing video games or riding my bike or studying. Giving my brain up. That's what's important.”

“I'm waiting for her to say "Craig, what you need to do is X" and for the Shift to occur. I want there to be a Shift so bad. I want to feel my brain slide back into the slot it was meant to be in, rest there the way it did before the fall of last year, back when I was young, and witty, and my teachers said I had incredible promise, and I had incredible promise, and I spoke up in class because I was excited and smart about the world. I want the Shift so bad. I'm waiting for the phrase that will invoke it. It'll be like a miracle within my life. But is Dr. Minerva a miracle worker? No. She's a thin, tan lady from Greece with red lipstick.”

“I wasn't going to have enough money to pay for a Good Lifestyle, which meant I'd feel ashamed, which meant I'd get depressed, and that was the big one because I knew what that did to me: it made it so I wouldn't get out of bed, which led to the ultimate thing—homelessness. If you can't get out of bed for long enough, people come and take your bed away.”

“What happened when you woke up?" "I was having a dream. I don’t know what it was, but when I woke up, I had this awful realization that I was awake. It hit me like a brick in the groin." "Like a brick in the groin, I see.""I didn't want to wake up. I was having a much better time asleep. And that's really sad. It was almost like a reverse nightmare, like when you wake up from a nightmare you're so relieved. I woke up into a nightmare." "And what is that nightmare, Craig?""Life." "Life is a nightmare.""Yes.”

“I have a system with bathrooms. I spend a lot of time in them. They are sanctuaries, public places of peace spaced throughout the world for people like me.”

“Dreams are only dreams until you wake up and make them real.”

“Ski. Sled. Play basketball. Jog. Run. Run. Run. Run home. Run home and enjoy. Enjoy. Take these verbs and enjoy them. They're yours, Craig. You deserve them because you chose them. You could have left them all behind but you chose to stay here. So now live for real, Craig. Live. Live. Live. Live.Live.”

“I like how you don't hide your problems like everyone else, and I don't have to hide mine when I'm around you.”

“Sometimes I wish I had an easy answer for why I'm depressed.”

“I don't know how I can be so ambitious and so lazy at the same time.”

“We're all animals, high school is animals, but some of us are more animal than others. Like in 'Animal Farm,' which I read, all animals are created equal, but some are more equal than others? Here in the real world, all equals are created animal, but some are more animal than others.”

“It was almost like a reverse nightmare, like when you wake up from a nightmare, you're so relieved. I woke up into a nightmare.""And what is that nightmare, Craig?""Life.”