“Then I looked at myself in the mirror. I was proud of myself, of my entire life, of everything I have done. It was the BEST feeling... I didn't want to leave that place. I wish I never woke up.”

“Do you believe in Angels or God?...I do.”

“I learned in high school, if I hold up an effigy, a mask, or a lie, that mask will get all the love, not me.”

“I thank her for starting that rumor in my brain that I was lovable. I thank her for her one-woman cult of blood, cum, spit, and razors that called me exquisite and shunned all the winners, cheerleaders, cops, and clear-skinned Hollywood movie stars.”

“It has been my lot to have found myself in many distant lands. I have never been in one without finding a Scotchman, and I never found a Scotchman who was not head of the poll.”

“I wanted to tell them that I'd never had a friend, not ever, not a real one. Until Dante. I wanted to tell them that I never knew that people like Dante existed in the world, people who looked at the stars, and knew the mysteries of water, and knew enough to know that birds belonged to the heavens and weren't meant to be shot down from their graceful flights by mean and stupid boys. I wanted to tell them that he had changed my life and that I would never be the same, not ever. And that somehow it felt like it was Dante who had saved my life and not the other way around. I wanted to tell them that he was the first human being aside from my mother who had ever made me want to talk about the things that scared me. I wanted to tell them so many things and yet I didn't have the words. So I just stupidly repeated myself. "Dante's my friend.”

“I had a feeling there was something wrong with me. I guess I was a mystery even to myself.”