“The swallow's wings popped open, but they flapped awkwardly at the sides of its body like wild oars. And then, as the bird fell with skittering wings, it gave one solid thrum. This slowed its descent, momentarily. It gave another thrum, and another, and then, as if its body remembered what it was supposed to do, the bird began to beat its wings rhythmically. The muscle memory was still within it. It was still losing ground, but it was flapping at least.”

“I love the way the French shove chocolate into everything. It's, like, the best nervous tic ever.”

“To him food was identity, culture, family, how you define home and love and who you are - all of it at once....It's not just the pie. It's the chemistry and physics. It's place and time and history and religion and music...I felt blurred by his presence, overwhelmed with double vision - the world as I was seeing it and the world as Henry would have.”

“This was how the world persisted. The heaviness of despair - how could it exist in the midst of mascara, zippers, brunches ? It marched forward even when I was barely able to stand....It had been hard on all of us - not only missing Henry, but facing the idea that your whole world can change, suddenly irreversibly. We were reminded how flimsy everything is, as frail as the airmail envelopes my mother had sent us the summer she disappeared. This is the life you have and then it's gone. I felt sorry for my mother, I knew what it was like not to be able to help your child, to change the incomprehensible randomness of life, to reverse a loss.”

“Looking at a sea bird flapping its wings against the full moon I wish I could grow wings and fly away from everything and be free. I wish I could lose myself in the vast ocean and float away from all this pain in my heart.”

“Children. For all of the times that you miss out on things you'd like to do because of them, there are an equal number of excuses they offer to get out of things you'd like to miss.”

“...almost like they had sucked up all the air in the room, and I was left oxygen-deprived. But with Henry, I had air again, I could breathe. He thought I was funny, and so I got funnier. He thought I was beautiful, and so I felt more beautiful. He thought I was experimental in the kitchen, and so I experimented more brilliantly. We had our problems, yes, but even our problems bound us closer. And now I knew what it was like to be only half of a pair and less of myself.”