“Sometimes I can't see myself when I'm with you. I can only just see you.”

“I'm not myself.' '...You can never say that. You're just a piece of yourself right now that you don't like.”

“Sometimes love means not being able to bear seeing the one you love the way they are, when they’re not what you hoped for them.”

“I'm not myself," she offered, guiltily. She softened around Tik Tok, and when she did she was, for those rare moments, girlish.He smiled. "You can never say that. You're just a piece of yourself right now that you don't like.”

“I like to think that nothing's final, and that everyone gets to be together even when it looks like they don't, that it all works out even when all the evidence seems to say something else, that you and I are always young in the woods, and that I'll see you sometime again, even if it's not with any kind of eyes I know of or understand. I wouldn't be surprised if that is the way things go after all - that all things end happy.”

“It turned out that my curiosity did not outweigh my courage after all. Sometimes love means not being able to bear seeing the one you love the way they are, when they're not what you hoped for.”

“I just wanted to see if... we were okay," she said, feeling relief. "Just to make sure we can be friends. I don't want it to be weird, you know?" Friends? Different parts of Birdie died as she said it. It was like stars exploding and burning one by one. She wondered if this was part of getting older. Parts of your heart exploded and died.”