“My point is, I would never hurt you or your family.”I raised my chin at him. “If you tried to hurt my mother, I would totally kick your ass.”“Aha.”“Yes. You would be lying on the ground, crying, ‘No more, no more,’ and I would be kicking you in the stomach, wham, wham, wham!” He laughed softly.”

“How awesome would that be? You open a box of Trix and wham! Out pops a hot guy! I would so eat more cereal.”

“I would kiss you anyway, but I have a feeling that if I tried– (Rafael) I’d kick you in the nuts and tear your ear off. (Celena)That would hurt. (Rafael)That’s the idea. (Celena)”

“That fist he was raising at me would wham into the cupboard door, hurting only himself. I saw it all happening, then it really did happen. But I didn't understand the whore thing. Why was he confusing the drinking with the other? Then I got it. Obvious. It was all mixed up for him, all the same thing: the drinking, the other, anything that could make a woman free.”

“What would you do?Would you jump? Would you feel pity for yourself? Would you think about your family and your childhood and your dreams and all you're leaving behind? Would it hurt? Would it feel like dying? Would you cry, as I did?”

“If you were M. Pujol, Madeleine says, I would reach out my hand to you. Like this.If you were M. Pujol, Adrien says, I would press my mouth against your pulse. Like this. If you were he, she says, I would cup your chin in my fingers.If you were he, he says, I would take those fingers into my mouth.Then my mouth would envy my fingers, she says.Then your mouth must usurp your fingers, he says.And then, she says, I would do this.”