“Remind me again why I put up with you?" ''Cause you sold me your soul for five bucks, and now you must submit to my will?' I still had the sheet of paper, written in his untidy fifth-grade scrawl. Gideon David Belmonte. One soul.”

“I forgive nothing. If you stole my orange crayon in the fifth grade, you're still on my hit list, buddy.”

“Kiss me to see if we still have it. 'Cause you own my heart,soul,and everything else in between.”

“You want to do it?""I might. If you offer me enough.""Howard—anything you ask. Anything. I'd sell my soul...""That's the sort of thing I want you to understand. To sell your soul is the easiest thing in the world. That's what everybody does every hour of his life. If I asked you to keep your soul—would you understand why that's much harder?”

“I had no power of how and when to remember her. You think you can put up a kind of shield. But remembering don't come to a man face forward—it corners around sideways. I was at the mercy of everything I saw and heard. Suddenly instead of me combing the countryside to find her, she begun to chase me around in my very soul. She chasing me mind you! And in my soul.”

“But I couldn't respond. My culture had taught me all the wrong things well. So I lay completely still, and gave no reaction at all. But the soul has no culture. The soul has no nations. The soul has no colour or accent or way of life. The soul is forever. The soul is one. And when the heart has its moment of truth and sorrow, the soul can't be stilled. I clenched my teeth against the stars. I closed my eyes. I surrendered to sleep. One of the reasons why we crave love, and seek it so desperately, is that love is the only cure for loneliness, and shame, and sorrow. But some feelings sink so deep into the heart that only loneliness can help you find them again. Some truths about yourself are so painful that only shame can help you live with them. And some things are just so sad that only your soul can do the crying for you.”