“She thought about her life and how lost she’d felt for most of it. She thought about the way that all truths she’d been taught to consider valuable invariably conflicted with the world as it was actually lived. How could a person be so utterly lost, yet remain living?”

“She thought about Cheryl’s contention that this was young love, and about how she’d feel if they were ever to break up and she had to look back on this moment as an episode in a life that was full of people she didn’t even know now. The thought made her want to cry.”

“She seems sort of lost.'I thought, Lost how? How am I lost? Suddenly I felt lost.”

“What a failure her life had been. Would she have lied to God if she’d had more faith, been more righteous? How could she possibly have a son at her age? And yet, if she had believed all along . . .”

“After all she’d been through, it irked her that he thought he could just look at her and know who she was. She didn't even know who she was.”

“All this time she’d thought it God’s will that she be a spinster. She had grown content with that expectation, taking satisfaction in the wisdom she’d gained through her experience with Stephen. No man would dupe her again. But what if living alone was never part of God’s plan for her? What if she chose that life because it was safe—because she was afraid?”