“You always felt destined for stardom of one kind or another. But the fear that maybe that wasn't true wouldn't leave you alone. That you were no more than the classes you'd taken, the schools you'd attended, the books you'd read, the languages you spoke, your scholarships, your master's thesis on Borges and the English writers, and so on, but nobody unique, with a talent only your own. You were desperate for something that was yours alone. I was yours alone, but that isn't what you meant.”

“You can't be friends with the person you were meant to spend your life with," he said, his eyes darkening. "So get on with your life and leave mine the hell alone.”

“Endless longing; a face you'd known since childhood, since birth almost; a body that moved as though it were your own. These were things you never spoke of, things you never hoped for; things you could never admit to. Things you'd die for, and die of.”

“What if the water that came out of the shower was treated with a chemical that responded to a combination of things, like your heartbeat and your body temperature and your brainwaves, so that your skin changed color according to mood? If you were extremely excited your skin would turn green, and if you we're angry you'd turn red, obviously, and if you felt like shiitake you'd turn brown and if you we're blue you'd turn blue.Everyone could know what everyone else felt and we could be more careful with each other, because you'd never want to tell someone who skin was purple that you're angry at her for being late, just like you'd want to pat a pink person on the back and say, "Congratulations!”

“If you lived today as if it were your last, you'd buy up a box of rockets and fire them all off, wouldn't you?”

“If you were left alone, you'd hate it. Loneliness gets old in a hurry”