“I don't think we should judge the value of our lives by how efficient they are.”

“Human beings are ultimately nothing but carriers-passageways- for genes. They ride us into the ground like racehorses from generation to generation. Genes don't think about what constitutes good or evil. They don't care whether we are happy or unhappy. We're just means to an end for them. The only thing they think about is what is most efficient for them.”

“But that was the last time. That was…how should I say it? ... the one moment in my life when I was able to draw closest to Eri ... the one moment when she and I joined heart to heart as one: there was nothing separating us. After that, it seems, we grew further and further apart. We separated, and before long we were living in different worlds. That sense of union I felt in the darkness of the lift, that strong bond between our hearts, never came back again. I don't know what went wrong, but we were never able to go back to where we started from.”

“No matter how deep and fatal the loss, no matter how important the thing that’s stolen from us - that’s snatched right out of our hands - even if we are left completely changed, with only the outer layer of skin from before, we continue to play out our lives this way, in silence.I dream. Sometimes I think that’s the only right thing to do. To dream, to live in the world of dreams - just as Sumire said. But it doesn’t last forever. Wakefulness always comes to take me back.”

“So that's how we live our lives. No matter how deep and fatal the loss, no matter how important the thing that's stolen from us--that's snatched right out of our hands--even if we are left completely changed, with only the outer layer of skin from before, we continue to play out our lives this way, in silence. We draw ever nearer to the end of our allotted span of time, bidding it farewell as it trails off behind. Repeating, often adroitly, the endless deeds of the everyday. Leaving behind a feeling of immeasurable emptiness.”

“I’ve never once thought about how I was going to die,” she said. “I can’t think about it. I don’t even know how I’m going to live.”

“I think most people live in fiction...That's how you keep your fragile body intact.”