“You get to Alcatraz by being the worst of the worst. Unless you're me. I came here because my mother said I had to.”

“Now I understand. When you love someone, you have to try things even if they don't make sense to anyone else.”

“You have to wait for good things to happen—wait and wait and work so hard—but bad things occur out of the blue, like fire alarms triggered in the dead of night, blaring randomly, a shock of sound, a chatter of current from which there is no turning back. There's only the day that starts like any other, and when it ends, it leaves you shaken, wobbly, unsure of where you stand, the patch of ground that holds your feet dissolving, disintegrating from under you. Often there's a sign, a harbinger of what's to come. Sometimes there are many signs, like black crows scattered in the road, but they blend into the scenery on the path ahead. You can only spot them when you look back.”

“Nobody knows how things will turn out, that's why they go ahead and play the game...You give it your all and sometimes amazing things happen, but it's hardly ever what you expect.”

“Life is amazing, isn't it? You can't ever tell what will happen. Nobody knows until they go ahead and play the game.”

“When I was young, I spent my days and nights trying to impress future generations. I spent them. They’re gone. All because I was deathly afraid of being forgotten. And then came the regret. The worst things of all worst things.”

“I came from Thailand for you, because Mia said she could probably get you here. I'd have come from Zimbabwe, Outer Mongolia, or a prison in Central America. In truth, I came through hell getting here....because for me that's anywhere you're not.”