“When you see an ex, you have to look better than you've ever looked. It's like the first rule of breakups. You have to make them think, 'Damn, I missed out on that?' It's the only way.”

“I loved him in a way you can really on do the first time around. It's the kind of love that doesn't know better and doesn't want to - it's dizzy and foolish and fierce.”

“I’ve only ever loved two boys—both of them with the last name Fisher. Conrad was first, and I loved him in a way that you can really only do the first time around. It’s the kind of love that doesn’t know better and doesn’t want to—it’s dizzy and foolish and fierce. That kind of love is really a one-time-only thing.”

“I laid myself fucking bare last night! I put it all out there, and you shut me down. Rightfully so. I get that I shouldn’t have said any of that stuff to you. But now here I am trying to find a way to come out of this with just a little fragment of pride so I can look you in the eye when this is all over, and you won’t even let me have that. You broke my heart last night, all right? Is that what you want to hear?”

“Do you like Cam?” the girl asked me casually. I wondered how she knew him—I thought he’d been a nobody just like me.“I barely even know him,” I told her, and her face relaxed. She was relieved. I recognized that look in her eyes—dreamy and hopeful. It must have been the way I looked when I used to talk about Conrad, used to try to think of ways to insert his name into conversation. It made me sad for her, for me.”

“There are moments in every girl’s life that are bigger than we know at the time. When you look back, you say, that was one of those life-changing,fork-in-the-road moments and I didn’t even see it coming. I had no idea.”

“Do you remember infinity?”Slowly, I turned around. “What about it?”Tossing something toward me, he said, “Catch.”I reached out and caught it in the air. A silver necklace. I held it up and examined it. The infinity necklace.It didn’t shine the way it used to; it looked a bit coppery now. But I recognized it. Of course I recognized it.“What is this?” I asked.“You know what it is,” he said.I shrugged. “Nope, sorry.”I could see that he was both hurt and angry. “Okay, then. You don’t remember it. I’ll remind you. I boughtyou that necklace for your birthday.”My birthday.It had to have been for my sixteenth birthday. It was the only year he ever forgot to buy me a birthdaypresent—the last summer we’d all been together at the beach house, when Susannah was still alive.”