“All I know is that I carried you for nine months. I fed you, I clothed you, I paid for your college education. Friending me on Facebook seems like a small thing to ask in return.”

“Where did you go?""To the end of the driveway," my mother says. "I was nine months pregnant; that was the maximum distance I could waddle without feeling as if my uterus was falling out."I wince. "Do you have to be quite so graphic?""What would you like me to call it, Zoe? A fetal living room?”

“Three months ago, if you asked me, I would have told you that if you really loved someone, you’d let them go. But now I look at you, and I dreamed about Maggie, and I see that I’ve been wrong. If you really love someone, Allie, I think you have to take them back.”

“You can feel people staring: it's like heat that rise from the pavement during summer, like a poker in the small of your back. You don’t have to hear a whisper, either, to know that it’s about you. I use to stand in front of the mirror in the bathroom to see what they are staring at. I wanted to know what made their heads turn, what it was about me that was so incredibly different. At first I couldn’t tell. I mean, I was just me. Then one day. When I looked in the mirror, I understood. I looked into my own eyes and I hated myself, maybe as much as all of them did. That was the day I started to believe they might be right.jodi picoult”

“Marina sighs. “Love is like a tidal wave,” she says. “Because it sweeps you off your feet?” I ask. “No, because it sucks you under and you drown.” “But sometimes,” I point out, “it’s the only thing that keeps you afloat.”

“Daddy, you would say, look at my braids. Look at the worst bug bite ever. Look at my handstand, my eggroll dive, my finger painting. Look at my splinter, my spelling list, my somersault, the toad I found. Look at the present I made you, the grade I got, the acceptance letter. Look at the diploma, the ultrasound, your granddaughter. I couldn’t possibly remember all the things you’ve asked me to look at. I just remember that you asked.”

“i don't know. i don't care. all i know is when you pay for something that's supposed to give you a cup of coffee, you deserve to get your fucking cup of coffee.”