“a crying grown-up with no visible damage, who knew what that meant?”

“That meant that Nancy was the grown-up, the one who got to decide everything. And it meant that Bean was the little, boring, poopy baby who didn't get to decide anything.”

“Hazel understood. Being grown up meant doing what grown-ups wanted you to do. it meant sacrificing your imagination for rules. It meant sitting quietly in you chair while your best friend is helicoptered off for emergency eye surgery. It meant letting people say whatever they wanted to you.”

“Perhaps growing up meant we put our knives away and feigned ignorance of the damage.”

“I watched Titanic when I got back home from the hospital, and cried. I knew that my IQ had been damaged.”

“Even in this world of course it is the stupidest children who are most childish and the stupidest grown-ups who are most grown-up.”