“There is a whole other world with an entirely different version of me, a me that is not pretty, a me that no boys want, a me she would never talk to.”

“She didn't want to encourage me by asking questions. She didn't want me to go deeper into that other world. She worried she would lose her Matilda to Victorian England.”

“*Okay, you make eating hos sound pretty. talk poetry to me, writer boy.*”

“She taught me I should never do anything in private I did not want talked about in public, and cautioned me not to talk in my sleep.”

“It sounds so perfect. He’s defending me because Carey would want him to. It’s not about me. It never is, with these two boys. Blake lets me take the blame, and Carey uses me.”

“the whole idea of boys being people you would actually choose to spend time with was pretty much totally incomprehensible to me. i could never think of anything to say to them, and they seemed equally dumbstruck by my presence. ”