“The love I felt for her on that train ride had a capital and provinces, parishes and a Vatican, an orange planet and many sullen moons -- it was systemic and it was complete.”

“My fellow, you strike me at present as being situated in the moon, kingdom of dream, province of illusion, capital: Soap-Bubble.”

“My arm draped her shoulder; we both felt safe, as if we were a complete solar system unto ourselves, dangling in the sky, warm heated planets inside a universe of stars.-Richard”

“Everything he'd done with regard to her in the last three years had been calculated to foreclose the intensely personal sort of talks they'd had when he was younger: to get her to shut up, to train her to contain herself, to make her stop pestering him with her overfull heart and her uncensored self. And now that the training was complete and she was obediently trivial with him, he felt bereft of her and wanted to undo it.”

“I wanted to like her and I wanted her to like me and that was more want than I had saddled myself with in many a moon.”

“If Eastlake High School were the universe, I would be one of the moons circling Planet Emma, constantly hidden by her shadow, and glad to be there. Nash Hudson would be one of the stars: too bright to look at, too hot to touch and at the center of his own solar system.”