“Don’t you see? It’s like we’ve known each other all these years. Without even seeing each other. It’s like there’s been this . . . this ghost relationship between us. You laying out my plectrums on the floor, me buying black-and-white cookies every time I knew you would be coming over. You didn’t know that was me, but it was.”

“It’s like they don’t even know how to stand beside each other without one groping the other. Their clinginess has always annoyed me.”

“Tell me about it. It’s so hard to deal with a single parent. They take out all their anxiety on you. It’s like,she’s so angry all the time. And I didn’t even do anything!”“That’s so wrong.”“Yeah.”“Where’s your dad?”“I don’t know. My mom had me when she was still in high school, so . . .”“You don’t see him at all?”“No, and I don’t want to. I have no interest in maintaining a relationship with someone who didn’t loveme enough to stick around.”

“It doesn’t change what we are to each other. It’s like there’s always been a piece of my soul missing, and it’s inside you, Clary.”

“You forgave me in a dream the other night. The more you told me it was alright, the worse I felt. I know that you were only doing it because you knew I couldnt possibly hurt you more than I already had. I could see what forgiving me was doing to you. I know that you think I'm to stupid to figure it all out. When you forgave me, you knew that it was finally over. The pain would leave me, I would forget you and you would never see me again except in a dream. It is sad that the things that we saw in each other are no longer there. It is a shame that we tore each other apart looking for things that we needed desperately but could never find. It is tragic that we only wanted to give each other but only stole from ourselves and blamed each other for the emptiness in our lives. I see you differently now. I no longer fear you. It took years to see you for what you really are.”

“Perhaps it would have been easier if I said that not being able to find something is like suddenly not remembering the words to your favorite song that you knew by heart. It’s like suddenly forgetting the name of someone you know really well and see every day, or the name of a television show you watched for years. It’s something so frustrating that it plays on your mind over and over again because you know there’s an answer but no one can tell you it. It niggles and niggles at me and I can’t rest until I know the answers.”