“Kyle had gone from confused and possibly hurt to a card-carrying member of PFLAG. Literally; he’d shown Brad the card the other day.”

“Plus he was naturally lucky at cards. As Mam had always said, lucky at cards, or lucky at life. One or the other. Not both.”

“There was a rich old guy named John Donnelly who must have donated a bunch of money. He had forgotten his member card one day, and when I tried to explain that it was a four-dollar fee to enter without a card, he went batshit. "Don't you know who I am, goddammit?" I had never seen him before. "Do you know who I am?" I wanted to say. "Then how could I know who you are? We don't know each other.”

“He wondered how Vilania was doing. He’d have to send her and her partner, Opal, a Christmas card. Thank the gods that Opal had been walking by when the ceremony started or he’d be married to a lesbian right now.”

“I could see Sulla showing her the Cards of Providence, the cards that would one day form the spread that showed her my death.”

“The person he'd hurt the most though, ultimately, was himself.It was his dreams that had come to nothing. His future that had folded before his eyes, like a house of cards.”