“If you must know, I-I had never in my life kissed a young lady, and you are far too beautiful to me to want to get it wrong!”

“Look, I have no idea what's going on," I said, catching my breath. "I don't like myself either. I don't know what's happening to me. I don't want to tell you to fuck off. But you gotta understand, everything in my life feels different. I just want so badly to know if you like me. And I know how asinine that sounds. If you want me to leave you alone, I will, but sometimes... sometimes you meet somebody and you know that whatever you did before, whatever your life was before, it must have been right... nothing could've been too bad or gone too far wrong because it led you to this person. You're that person. Do you want me to go away?”

“I want to run out and kiss her fantastic beauty, kiss it and say, "You carry away with you a reflection of me, a part of me. I dreamed you, I wished for your existence. You will always be part of my life. If I love you, it must be because we have shared at some time the same imaginings, the same madness, the same stage.”

“You can include me, too." William blew Olivia a kiss, and her cheeks heated with a blush. "No need to say anything. I already know what words are perched on your tongue. Stop me if I'm wrong, but my getting to know you will be your pleasure.”

“Michel. In my dreams, you come and get me. You take me by the hand and you lead me away. This life is too much for me to bear. I look at the key and I long for you and for the past. For the innocent, easy days before the war. I know now my scars will never heal. I hope my son will forgive me. He will never know. No one will ever know.”

“And if I had not a letter to write myself, I might sit by you and admire the evenness of your writing, as another young lady once did. But I have an aunt too, who must not be longer neglected.”