“What would I look like if everything that I am, no secrets, was put on paper? Would I be horrifying?”

“I still love you," Aaron says softly, "I wish I can just turn it off, or that it would have faded away. I wish I could say I'm not the same man I was when you left me, that I've changed. But I am who I am, Caitlin. And all the magic in the world wouldn't change that.”

“What are you?” he demanded. “A slayer?" I rolled my eyes. “The name's Val, not Buffy. Do I look like a blond cheerleader with questionable taste in men?”

“I wouldn't hit a girl, but i'd beat a bitches ass!”

“Loss isn't an absence after all. It is a presence. A strong presence right next to me. I look at it. It doesn't look like anything, that's what is so strange. It just fits in.”

“I feel like men are more romantic than women. When we get married we marry, like, one girl, 'cause we're resistant the whole way until we meet one girl and we think I'd be an idiot if I didn't marry this girl she's so great. But it seems like girls get to a place where they just kinda pick the best option... 'Oh he's got a good job.' I mean they spend their whole life looking for Prince Charming and then they marry the guy who's got a good job and is gonna stick around.”

“I'm a survivor. I was thinking about what you said, and you're absolutely right - I have to let go to continue. This devastating news is not going to slow me down. I'm my own person. I always have been. I've never believed in those people who blame everything on their parents - you know, I'm a fuck-up because my father was a fuck-up. Or I'm a drunk because my mother was an alcoholic. So my father was a hit man? Maybe. So he murdered my mother? Maybe. I don't know any of these things for a fact. But I'm accepting them, and I'm beginning to realize they're not part of who I am.”