“I'm being fair, it was the best kiss of my life- a kiss that finds all your seams and pulls them apart, stitch by detail stitch.”

“Perhaps thee will best understand what Abigail is like if I tell thee that when she quilts she prefers to stitch in the ditch, hiding her poor stitches in the seams between the blocks.”

“The details that are my life's special pattern, like how in handwoven rugs what really makes them unique are the tiny flaws in the stitching, little gaps and jumps and stutters that can never be reproduced.”

“All day long you sit and sew,Stitch life down for fear it grow,Stitch life down for fear we guessAt the hidden ugliness.Dusty voice that throbs with heat,Hoping with your steel-thin beatTo put stitches in my mind,Make it tidy, make it kind,You shall not: I'll keep it freeThough you turn earth, sky and seaTo a patchwork quilt to keepYour mind snug and warm in sleep!”

“I need to know for sure that you're feeling every single thing that I'm feeling the moment my lips touch yours. Because I want your first kiss to be the best first kiss in the history of first kisses.”

“But then, that was the problem with pretty toy stitches. When real life got hold of them, they always tore out.”