“He took the last seat, as usual, a subtle reminder of what he was and what he had become.”

“Change occurs when one becomes what he is, not when he tries to become what he is not.”

“The person who says he knows what he thinks but cannot express it usually does not know what he thinks.”

“[he] had become the bloke in the joke: the last man on earth”

“And then he sank back and tried, as usual, not to think. He must succeed. That's what the world was made for. That's what he was made for. That was what he would have to do.”

“In her own fumbling way, she’d reminded him he was just a man, fallible, needful, a member of the supremely imperfect human race…and shamefully undeserving of what she had to offer. Looking at Billie, touching her, tasting her, had filled him with a wanting fiercer than any he’d known. For the first time, he was faced with something he couldn’t truly have, because of what he’d become.”