“pain can work form the outside in.”

“She was grinning and she should have been pretty when she grinned. She had good white teeth and a lovely, delicate mouth. But something always went wrong with Denise's smile. There was always something manic in it.”

“Black coffee’s a lot like whiskey, you know? All devil and no trimmin’s. Always liked my sins pure and take it as it comes.”

“The dialogue is solo now. I don’t talk. No matter who’s in bed with me I never do. My thoughts slip off into nightmares sometimes but I don’t share them. I have become now what I only began to be then—completely self-protective.”

“As though all the world were a bad joke and she was the only one around who knew the punchline.”

“ Meow is like aloha - it can mean anything.”

“Yes, I'm tough as nails, got a heart of steel I will never fear for I will never feel.”