“Lena remembered herself in all the old familiar things they said. She existed in her friends; there she was. All the parts of herself she'd forgotten. She knew herself best when she was with them.”

“She existed in her friends; there she was. All the parts of herself she'd forgotten. She knew herself best when she was with them.”

“Because she was raw and uncertain, and she liked to keep all the messy parts of herself to herself. ... As much as Lena liked to hide the mess and display the finished product, by this point she was all mess and no product.”

“Lena always described how she dreaded and mourned things before they even happened. Carmen was beginning to suspect that she was permitting herself to mourn this long separation only now that it was over.”

“People said things they didn't mean all the time. Everybody else in the world seemed able to factor it in. But not Lena. Why did she believe the things people said? Why did she cling to them so literally? Why did she think she knew people when she clearly didn't? Why did she imagine that the world didn't change, when it did? Maybe she didn't change. She believed what people said and she stayed the same." (Lena, 211)”

“Those were the people who made her something, and without them she was different. She'd held on to them and to that old self tenaciously, though. She clung to it, celebrated it, worshipped it even, instead of constructing a new grown-up life for herself. For years she'd been eating the cold crumbs left over from a great feast, living on them as though they could last her forever.”

“She went around with a broken heart, and she wasn't sure who'd broken it. She thought it was herself, mostly.”