“Not with a mother like mine.” I let out a sigh. “I can hear her right now. ‘Boone, do you have to kiss like such a slut? Good Christ, if your tongue goes any farther down his throat you’ll be able to tell what the man had for breakfast. Do it like they did in those old-time movies…classy…not like a sailor on leave.”

“You like doing that, don't you?''Yes, I like kissing you.''No,' she said, 'lifting me off my feet. Carrying me around. Pulling me down to kiss you whenever you get the urge.' She turned to him with a mock glare. 'I think it goes hand in hand with the telling me what to do stuff.'He didn't let go of her hand as he lifted his to run the back of one knuckle down her cheek. 'You like it, too.”

“Then you shouldn't have thrown her away when she was your wife. Now she ain't. Now she's somethin' to me and I don't let men I don't like get close to her and I gotta tell you man, I do not like you.”

“I remember I once saw this old movie...; in it the main character was talking about how sad it is that the last time you have sex you don't know it's the last time. Since I've never even had a first time, I'm not exactly an expert, but I'm guessing it's like that for most things in life--the last kiss, the last laugh, the last cup of coffee, the last sunset, the last time you jump through a sprinkler or eat an ice-cream cone, or stick your tongue out to catch a snowflake. You just don't know.But I think that's a good thing, really, because if you did know it would be almost impossible to let go. When you do know, it's like being asked to step off the edge of a cliff: all you want to do is get down on your hands and knees and kiss the solid ground, smell it, hold on to it.”

“You got to knock a man down and put your knife at his throat before he'll hear you, like I did to that trooper. The truth seems hateful to most everybody.”

“Any man can do what he likes. Right, Splitfoot?’‘Right, Chief.’‘Just as long as it’s exactly what I fucking tell ’em to do.”