“I know this is going to come as a shock to me, but I am leaving me. Perhaps I`ll say I could not have seen this coming, but truthfully things have been wrong between me for some time. Time heals and I`m sure in time I`ll build a new life without me”

“It struck me that this was the second time in a couple of days that just yelling someone's name on the street could have spelled disaster. Then it struck me how wrong that was. To have to keep your life sectioned off like that. A signal that you'd fallen into a bad way to live.”

“Stella says when we were kids and things got bad she would go outside herself. She said she would be in a spot near the ceiling in the corner of the room. Watching. Like everything was happening to somebody else. Like you watch a movie on a screen. Not me. I tuck in. I go into an even deeper place in myself. And I pull the covers in over me. And then I dare you to find me. You have to find me to touch me or hurt me. At least, the part of me that really counts. I go inside and just hold very still. And part of me feels dead. Like it doesn't matter. Whatever it is. It just doesn't matter.”

“[Rayleen talking to Billy.] "Grace is thriving here, and I dare anybody to challenge that. Anybody who has a problem with that can come take it up with me.""Thank God," Billy said, "because I really hate it when people come take things up with ME.”

“I try to think of a way to get there without going past it. There are lots of ways, but they all have me walking a little farther. And that's stupid, I decide. What am I, a little kid? I can stand to see something it hurts to want. I can see it and then just keep walking. It happens to lots of people everyday. We all survive.”

“I guess if you're really a friend, you overlook certain things. Its easy to be friends with someone who only says things you want to hear. I guess if you're really a friend, you have to cut a friend some slack.”

“I think it's the things we don't talk about that make us old before out time.”