“We said we'd be friends.'He looks confused. 'Yeah.'I don't want to be.'There's space between us, and in that space there's darkness. I take another step, so close that we share a breath. The same one. In and out.Tess,' he says. I know it's a warning, but I don't care.What's the worst thing that can happen?'It'll hurt,' he says.It already hurts.'He nods very slowly. And it's like there's a hole in time, as if everything stops and in this one minute, where we look at each other so close, is spread out between us. As he leans towards me, I feel a strange warmth filtering through me. I forget that my brain is full of every sad face at every window I've ever passed.”

“I love you. It hurts more than anything ever has, but I do. So don't you dare tell me I don't. Don't you ever say it again!”

“I feel something very small growing inside me as I look at her, and I realize in one absolutely clear moment that I don't like her at all.'You know what?' I say. 'Forget it. I'll do the list by myself.'She stands up, swings her stupid hair about and tries to look offended. It's a trick that works with guys, but it makes no difference to the way I feel about her.”

“I like you," he said.He made it sound as if she was bound to disagree with him. She nodded. His face said he was telling her something very important.He said, "I mean it. Whatever happens, you have to believe that.”

“this mad psycho tells everyone to get into a field and says I’m going to pick one of you just one of youout of all of you to die and everyone’s looking around thinking it’s so unlikely to be me because there’sthousands of us so statistically it’s completely unlikely and the psycho walks up and down looking ateveryone and when he gets near me he hesitates and he smiles and then he points right at me and saysyou’re the one and the shock that it’s me and yet of course it’s me why wouldn’t it be I knew all along”

“Adam strokes my head, my face, he kisses my tears. We are blessed.Let them all go.The sound of a bird flying low across the garden. Then nothing. Nothing. A cloud passes. Nothing again. Light falls through the window, falls onto me, into me. Moments.All gathering towards this one.”

“Death straps me to the hospital bed, claws its way onto my chest and sits there.I didn't know it would hurt this much. I didn't know that everything good that's ever happened in my life would be emptied out by it.”