“Mary Jane. Listen. Please," Eloise said, sobbing. "You remember our freshman year, and I had that brown-and-yellow dress I bought in Boise, and Miriam Ball told me nobody wore those kind of dresses in New York, and I cried all night?" Eloise shook Mary Jane's arm. "I was a nice girl," she pleaded, "wasn't I?”

“Jane," I said quietly.She opened her eyes, she had been far away in prayer."Yes, Mary? Forgive me, I was praying.""If you go on flirting with the king with those sickly little smiles, one of us Boleyns is going to scratch your eyes out.”

“Mary-Lynnette: "You have not read 'Pride and Prejudice'."Ash: "Why not?"Mary-Lynnette: "Because Jane Austen was a human."Ash: "How do you know?"Mary-Lynnette: "Well Jane Austen was a woman, and you're a chauvinist pig."Ash: "Yes, well, that I can't argue.”

“Don't leave me, Rainbow Girl."Rainbow Girl. Was that who I was?It seemed so long ago. I smiled faintly. "Remember the skirt I wore to Mallucé's the night you told me to dress Goth?""It's upstairs in your closet. Never throw it away. It looked like a wet dream on you.”

“Charlie ... have you ever kissed a girl?" I shook my head no. It was so quiet. "Not even when you were little?" I shook my head no again. And she looked very sad. She told me about the first time she was kissed. She told me that it was with one of her dad's friends. She was seven. And she told nobody about it except for Mary Elizabeth and then Patrick a year ago. And she started to cry. And she said something that I won't forget. Ever. "I know that you know that I like Craig. And I know that I told you not to think of me that way. And I know that we can't be together like that. But I want to forget all those things for a minute. Okay?" "Okay." "I want to make sure that the first person you kiss loves you. Okay?" "Okay." She was crying harder now. And I was, too, because when I hear something like that I just can't help it. "I just want to make sure of that. Okay?" "Okay." And she kissed me. It was the kind of kiss that I could never tell my friends about out loud. It was the kind of kiss that made me know that I was never so happy in my whole life.”

“My mother drove me to Boston and bought me a beautiful blue dress that touched the floor, spilling out in waves; I wore the ocean in the shape of a girl.”