“She gave me a hug and for a second I was embraced by a body that makes me want to go home and never eat again.”

“Everyone on earth would never starve and forever find love and happiness, since we won, but if we’d lost, they would have gouged out our eyes and thrown us naked onto hot coals and poisonous snakes for all the cheering and hugging at the end, strangers hugging like the end of The Omega Virus when Steve Sturmine finds the antidote.”

“I'm sitting on the lumbering late bus, thinking about the way I'm going to start my Monday: by filling out an unexcused absence form for the cranky secretary. The last time the bus was late she actually told me, "Don't tell me the bus was late. That excuse won't work anymore today. About ten kids ahead of you said that their bus was late, too." I tried to explain that we all took the same bus, but there was no pulling the wool over her eyes. She wasn't born yesterday.”

“Help me,' Allison says, but she is soft-spoken, and everyone she loves is so far away.”

“I want to love you and take you pretty places. Yes, I have things wrong, but also I can walk through walls if you'll let me show you.”

“I opened my mouth and kissed you then, the first time all night, attacked you and surrendered completely, and let’s get out of here. I’m ready, I’m finished, let’s not break up, no, no. Take me home, my boyfriend, my love.”

“Let’s go, let’s go together toward something extraordinary and I started making plans, thinking we would get that far.”