“Can I have a glass of water?" Her voice was hoarse, probably from screaming. She'd always sounded like that after they'd-He didn't just force the thought aside. He clubbed it unconscious, threw it into a crawl space and walled it up alive.”

“He wondered if she'd mind if he threw her down on the blanket and tore off her clothing. (..) She looked heartbreakingly innocent. Alex sighed. She'd probably mind.”

“He wasn't a romantic. Had never thought himself as sentimental. But he wanted this one last kiss. "Well", he said, his voice hoarse and grainy, "we'll always have Peru.”

“He's more than just a good-looking guy and you know it." But, I thought, he doesn't have flashlight eyes or a cocky-bastard smile that can boil water or a voice from the heavens and most of all he says things like, It's only rock 'n' roll.”

“After all that carryin' on just gettin' him out and keepin' him alive he wanted to crawl back in my womb and well...I ain't got the room no more even if he could do it. There wasn't space for him in my womb (71).”

“But maybe this is what Hannah has always wanted: a man who will deny her. A man of her own who isn't hers. Isn't it the real reason she broke up with Mike--not because he moved to North Carolina for law school (he wanted her to go with him, and she said no) but because he adored her? If she asked him to get out of bed and bring her a glass of water, he did. If she was in a bad mood, he tried to soothe her. It didn't bother him if she cried, or if she didn't wash her hair or shave her legs or have anything interesting to say. He forgave it all, he always thought she was beautiful, he always wanted to be around her. It became so boring! She'd been raised, after all, not to be accommodated but to accommodate, and if she was his world, then his world was small, he was easily satisfied. After a while, when he parted her lips with his tongue, she'd think, Thrash, thrash, here we go. She wanted to feel like she was striving cleanly forward, walking into a bracing wind and learning from her mistakes, and she felt instead like she was sitting in a deep, squishy sofa, eating Cheetos, in an overheated room. With Oliver, there is always contrast to shape their days, tension to keep them on their toes: You are far form me, you are close to me. We are fighting, we are getting along.”