“Uh, what are you doing?''What does it look like I'm doing?' Jake asks, settling into the seat beside me. The bus jerks forward. 'I'm sitting beside you.''No, you're not. Your seat is in the middle. Nice try, though.'He has the audacity to ignore me, sets his book bag on his lap and rummages through it. After a minute, he pulls out a folded sheet of paper and hands it to me.I unfold it. 'A love letter? How sweet.''No.' He turns pink. 'It's just something I found on the Internet-''Porn? You shouldn't have.”

“I don't like you with Becky. She's not a very nice girl.''I don't like you with Jake. He's not me.”

“He tells me its going to be okay until all the words blur together into a hum that makes me close my eyes and I start to go away and five, ten, fifteen minutes later, I'm aware of my hand sliding down his lap and then nothingness and then the gentle sensation of his index finger pressing into my open palm and then his hand is at my face, running his fingers across my skin and I'm so awake.”

“I thought it could be something, I mean, eventually." Harrison finally looks at us. "My life I thought-but I mean... it's nothing.""Don't cry" Grace says. "You have a lot of time.""No, I don't.""Yeah, you do.""No.-""Yeah! Yeah, you do. It's okay. Look-"She does something that is so amazingly selfless and also gross. She tilts Harrison's face up and gives him a sweet kiss on the lips and it lasts long enough for him to taste her back, to move his mouth against hers.Harrison stares at her dumbfounded but he's stopped cryingShe is so nice.”

“I feel the space beside me in a way that knows he's been gone a while. and my chest is winding itself tight with everything that means for me. What does that mean for me. I don't move because I don't want to move. I keep my eyes closed because I don't want to open my eyes.But eventually you have to move.Eventually you have to open your eyes.There's no note.”

“I'm struck by how amazing it is and how sad that makes me, because I've never seen that. He's not like that around me. The way his mouth quirks and lights up his eyes. He should smile more often. It's so innocent.”

“When he sees me, he stops.His eyes widen, his face pales.And then before i can say anything, he's holding me.And the worst part is-I want to hold him.But I also want to slap him, hit him. Punch him. Tear out his throat.I want him to tell me what he did to me was a mistake. Some horrible mix-up. . .after I'm done holding him back.”