“Marnie hated to see her spend so much of herself on someone who didn't care.”

“Marnie loved her better and more honestly than anyone else in the world, with the possible exception of her mother, who loved her intensely if not honestly.”

“She was never going to be the kind of person who didn't stick out in all directions. To want it was the same as hating herself. That was the truth. She breathed those words. She could have repeated them a hundred times and they wouldn't have hurt any worse. Reality was stubborn for sure, but it was large and it had possibilities. It was a sweet relief when you let it come.”

“She cared about him too much, and he was a dangerous person to love. He wouldn't love her back.”

“She wanted him to notice her so much.”

“The most haunting thing was not that he didn't love her anymore. She could have accepted that eventually. The most haunting thing was that he did. He loved her from afar. He loved her in a way that was preserved in time, that couldn't be sullied. And she tended it in her careful, curatorial way.”

“There was a satisfaction in being right and a terror in finding so much evidence that the world didn't work the way you or most other people thought it did.”