Tahereh Mafi

“That this girl would know exactly how to shatter me.”

“Ah, Ms. Ferrars. I don't know what you hope to accomplish by sitting in the corner.”

“Warner was supposed to be dead. Warner was supposed to be dead because I was supposed to have shot him but no one supposed I'd need to know how to fire a gun so now I suppose he's come to find me.He's come to fight.For me.”

“I almost forget that she still hates me, despite how hard I've fallen for her.And I've fallen.So hard.I've hit the ground.”

“That traitorous bastard. The idiot who thinks he's won himself a pretty girl. He has no idea who she is. No idea what she'd about to become.And if he thinks he's even remotely suited to match her, he's even more of an idiot than I gave him credit for.”

“Good God, I have taken leave of my senses. I never thank Delalieu. I've likely given the poor man a heart attack.”

“There was something about my face,she said, that she couldn't stand. Something about my eyes, the way I looked at her, the fact I even existed. She'd always tell me to stop looking at her. She'd always scream it. Like I might attack her. Stop looking at me, she'd scream. You just stop looking at me, she'd scream.She put my hand in the fire once.Just to see if it would burn, she said. Just to check if it was a regular hand, she said.I was 6 years old then.I remember because it was my birthday.”

“Only an idiot would rely on the energy of a bean or a leaf to stay awake throughout the day.”

“Sir, can you hear me?" Another cry. But this time, a voice I don't detest."Sire, please, can you hear me-""I've been shot, Delalieu," I manage to say. I open my eyes. Look into his watery ones. "I haven't gone deaf.”

“I don't remember what it means to breathe. I never, ever knew what it meant to feel.”

“He pulls my swaddled figure close to his chest and I shatter. Two three four fifty thousand pieces of feeling stab me in the heart, melt into drops of warm honey that soothe the scars in my soul.”

“And I've fallen.So hard.I've hit the ground. Gone right through it. Never in my life have I felt this. Nothing like this. I've felt shame and cowardice, weakness and strength. I've known terror and indifference, self-hate and general disgust. I've seen things that cannot be unseen.And yet I've known nothing like this terrible, horrible, paralyzing feeling. I feel crippled. Desperate and out of control. And it keeps getting worse. Every day I feel sick. Empty and somehow aching.Love is a heartless bastard.”

“For a moment I feel as though I exist outside of my body, as if I'm looking at myself from his perspective. I see my face, my injured arm, these legs that suddenly seem unable to carry my weight. Cracks begin to form along my face, all the way down my arms, my torso, my legs.I imagine this is what it's like to fall apart.”

“Jag tar hans ansikte mellan händerna, ställer mig på tå och kysser honom. Hans läppar är 2 kuddar, så mjuka, så sköna. "Jag älskar dig." Han ser mig i ögonen och ser på min mun och hans röst är en hes viskning. "Gör du?" "Absolut".”

“Sometimes I wish I could step outside of myself for a while. I want to leave this worn body behind, but my chains are too many, my weights too heavy.”

“Han tar mina händer och trycker dem mot sitt bröst, vägleder mina fingrar när de vandrar nerför hans bröstkorg innan hans läppar möter mina igen och igen och igen och drogar mig till ett delirium jag aldrig vill lämna.”

“Mitt ansikte är i hans händer och mina läppar är mot hans läppar och han kyssar mig och jag är syre och han behöver andas.”

“Torture is not torture when there’s any hope of relief.”

“Jag är ett väsen av bokstäver, en karaktär skapad av meningar, ett skönlitterärt fantasifoster.”

“If it were nothing but sexual attraction I’m sure I would not suffer such unbearable humiliation. But I wanted so much more than her body.”

“But the thought of laying a hand on someone brings back a world of memories, feelings, a flush of power I experience only when I make contact with skin not immune to my own. It's a rush of invincibility; a tormented kind of euphoria; a wave of intensity flooding every pore in my body. I don't know what it will do ti me. I don't know if I can trust myself to take pleasure in someone else's pain.”

“Because I want her.Now.Here. Everywhere.I want nothing between us.I want her clothes off and the lights on and I want to study her. I want to unzip her out of this dress and take my time with every inch of her.”

“Love is a heartless bastard”

“This girl is destroying me.”

“She is a soft, deadly creature. Kind and timid and terrifying. She's completely out of control and has no idea what she's capable of. And even though she hates me, I can't help but be fascinated by her. I'm enchanted by her pretend-innocence; jealous, even, of the power she wields so unwittingly. I want so much to be a part of her world. I want to know what it's like to be in her mind, to feel what she feels. It seems a tremendous weight to carry.And now she's out there, somewhere, unleashed on society.What a beautiful disaster.”

“People seldom realize that they tell lies with their lips and truths with their eyes all the time.”

“I’ve come to believe that the most dangerous man in the world is the one who feels no remorse. The one who never apologizes and therefore seeks no forgiveness. Because in the end it is our emotions that make us week, not our actions.”

“There’s something simmering inside of me. Something I’ve never dared to tap into, something I’m afraid to acknowledge. There’s a part of me clawing to break free from the cage I’ve trapped it in, banging on the doors of my heart, begging to be free. Begging to let go. Every day I feel like I’m reliving the same nightmare. I open my mouth to shout, to fight, to swing my fists, but my vocal cords are cut, my arms are heavy and weighted down as if trapped in wet cement and I’m screaming but no one can hear me, no one can reach me and I’m caught. And it’s killing me. I’ve always had to make myself submissive, subservient, twisted into a pleading, passive mop just to make everyone else feel safe and comfortable. My existence has become a fight to prove I’m harmless, and I’m not a threat, that I’m capable of living among other human beings without hurting them. And I’m so tired I’m so tire I’m so tired I’m so tired and sometimes I get so angry. I don’t know what’s happening to me.”

“Sometimes I close my eyes and paint these walls a different color. I imagine I’m wearing warm socks and sitting by a fire. I imagine someone’s given me a book to read, a story to take me away form the torture of my own mind. I want to be someone else somewhere else with something else to fill my mind. I want to run, to feel the wind tug at my hair. I want to pretend that this is just a story within a story. That this cell is just a scene, that these hands don’t belong to me, that this window leads to somewhere beautiful if only I could break it. I pretend this pillow is clean, I pretend this bed is soft. I pretend and pretend and pretend until the world becomes so breathtaking behind my eyelids that I can no longer contain it. But then my eyes fly open and I’m caught around the throat by a pair of hands that won’t stop suffocating suffocating suffocating. My thoughts, I think, will soon be sound. My mind, I hope, will soon be found.”

“My opinions,” I say to him, quietly this time, “should not so easily break your own. Stand by your convictions. Form clear and logical arguments. Even if I disagree.”

“Swallow the tears back often enough and they’ll start feeling like acid dripping down your throat. It’s that terrible moment when you’re sitting still so still so still because you don’t want them to see you cry you don’t want to cry but your lips won’t stop trembling and your eyes are filled to the brim with please and I beg you and please and I’m sorry and please and have mercy and maybe this time it’ll be different but it’s always the same. There’s no one to run to for comfort. No one on your side. Light a candle for me, I used to whisper to no one. Someone. Anyone. If you’re out there. Please tell me you can feel this fire.”

“I’ve fallen for her…So hard. I’ve hit the ground. Gone right through it. Never in my life have if felt this. Nothing like this…I’ve known nothing like this terrible, horrible, paralyzing feeling. I feel crippled. Desperate and out of control. And it keeps getting worse. Every day I feel sick. Empty and somehow aching. Love is a heartless bastard. I’m driving myself insane.”

“Watching her talk to someone else made me crazy. I was jealous. Ridiculous. I wanted her to know me; I wanted her to talk to me. And I felt it then: this strange, inexplicable sense that she might be the only person in the world I could really care about.”

“I want to tell her to stop, to leave, but parts of me are at war. I'm happy to have her close even if it hurts, even if it doesn't make any sense. But I can't seem to reach for her; I can't hold her like I've always wanted to.”

“You’ve suppressed all your rage and resentment because you wanted to be loved,” he says, no longer smiling. “Maybe I understand you, Juliette. Maybe you should trust me. Maybe you should accept the fact that you’ve tried to be someone you’re not for so long and that no matter what you did, those bastards were never happy. They were never satisfied. They never gave a damn, did they?” He looks at me and for a moment he seems almost human. For a moment I want to believe him. For a moment I want to sit on the floor and cry out the ocean lodged in mythroat.“It’s time you stopped pretending,” he says, so softly.“Juliette—” He takes my face in his gloved hands, so unexpectedly gentle.”

“In just two days, one girl has managed to cripple me.”

“Go to Hell."He works his jaw. Walks to the door. "I'm working on it.”

“I have an extremely low threshold for disorder; it offends my very being.”

“Friendship is not a thing I have ever experienced. Not as a child, and not as I am now.”

“My mind is a warehouse of carefully organized human emotions.I lock away the things that do not serve me.”

“I allowed myself to believe she’d seen a future for us; that she wanted to be with me and simply thought it impossible.”

“You're naked?" Kenji is suddenly studying my sheet and not bothering to be subtle about it. I flush despite my best efforts, flustered, frustrated. "Blondie said they destroyed my clothes.""Blondie?" Blond man is offended.”

“I feel like I've been fitted for wings.”

“Zaman öldürmek kulağa geldiği kadar zor bir şey değil. Yüz tane rakamı göğsünden vurabiliyor ve ondalık sayıların avucumda kanamalarını izleyebiliyordum. Sırf nefesimi tutarak saniyeleri boğabiliyordum. Saatlerce dakikaları öldürüyordum ve kimsenin umurunda olmuyordu.”

“Bilim adamlarının yanıldığını biliyordum. Dünya düzdü. Biliyordum çünkü tam kenarından aşağı fırlatılmıştım.”

“I watch him walk away with the only family he has left and I know why Adam joined the army. I know why he suffered through being Warner's whipping boy. I know why he dealt with the horrifying reality of war, why he was so desparate to run away, so ready to run way as soon as possible. Why he's so determined to fight back. He's fighting for so much more than himself.”

“There will be a bird today. It will be white with streaks of gold like a crown atop its head. It will fly.”

“I hate the lackadaisical ennui of a sun too preoccupied with itself to notice the infinite hours we spend in its presence.”

“The words get easier the moment you stop fearing them.”

“I love walking into a bookstore. It's like all my friends are sitting on shelves, waving their pages at me.”