“Everything seemed good, but I knew it had the potential to be awful.”

“Because it may seem like a small role now, but it matters. In the end, everything matters.”

“And after I dropped him off, I took the longest possible route home... I explored alleys and hidden roads I never knew existed. I discovered neighborhoods entirely new to me. And finally... I discovered I was sick of this town and everything in it.”

“Everything about it was false. Right then, in that office, with the realization that no one knew the truth about my life, my thoughts about the world were shaken.”

“I wanted people to trust me, despite anything they'd heard. And more than that, I wanted them to know me. Not the stuff they thought they knew about me. No, the real me. I wanted them to get past the rumors. To see beyond the relationships I once had, or maybe still had but that they didn't agree with.”

“I'm listening to someone give up. Someone I knew—someone I liked. I'm listening... but still, I'm too late.”

“I wanted to tell you everything. And that hurt because some things were too scary. Some things even I didn’t understand. How could I tell someone—someone I was really talking to for the first time—everything I was thinking?I couldn’t. It was too soon.”