“Are you currently at your house?" he asked."Um, no," I said."That was a trick question. I knew the answer, because I am currently at your house.”

“There are probably some girls who don't want guys to show up at their house randomly on a Tuesday night with questions about Edwin Schrödinger. I am sure such girls exist. But they don't live at my house.”

“Dear Ms. Lancaster, I fear your faith has been misplaced-but then, faith usually is. I cannot answer your questions, at least not in writing, because to write out such answers would constitute a sequel to An Imperial Affliction, which you might publish or otherwise share on the network that has replaced the brains of your generation. There is the telephone, but then you might record the conversation. Not that I don't trust you, of course, but I don't trust you. Alas, dear Hazel, I could never answer such questions except in person, and you are there while I am here. That noted, I must confess that the unexpected receipt of your correspondence via Ms. Vliegenthart has delighted me: What a wondrous thing to know that I made something useful to you-even if that book seems so distant from me that I feel it was written by a different man altogether. (The author of that novel was so thin, so frail, so comparatively optimistic!) Should you find yourself in Amsterdam, however, please do pay a visit at your leisure. I am usually home. I wouold even allow you a peek at my grocery lists. Your most sincerely, Peter Van Houten c/o Lidewij Vliegenthart”

“Augustus," I said. "Really. You don't have to do this.""Sure I do," he said. "I found my Wish.""God, you're the best," I told him."I bet you say that to all the boys who finance your international travel," he answered.”

“Do you have a Wish?' he asked, referring to this organization, The Genie Foundation, which is in the business of granting sick kids one wish.'No' I said. 'I used my Wish pre-Miracle.''What'd you do?'I sighed loudly. 'I was thirteen,' I said.'Not Disney,' he said.I said nothing.'You did not go to Disney World.'I said nothing.'HAZEL GRACE!' he shouted. 'You did not use your one dying Wish to go to Disney World with your parents.''Also Epcot Center,' I mumbled.'Oh, my God,' Augustus said. 'I can't believe I had a crush on a girl with such cliché wishes.”

“Still perfect,” he said. “Read to me.”“This isn’t really a poem to read aloud when you are sitting next to your sleeping mother. It has, like, sodomy and angel dust in it,” I said.“You just named two of my favorite pastimes,” he said. “Okay, read me something else then?”“Um,” I said. “I don’t have anything else?”“That’s too bad. I am so in the mood for poetry. Do you have anything memorized?”“‘Let us go then, you and I,’” I started nervously, “‘When the evening is spread out against the sky / Like a patient etherized upon a table.’”“Slower,” he said.I felt bashful, like I had when I’d first told him of An Imperial Affliction. “Um, okay. Okay. ‘Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets, / The muttering retreats / Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels / And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells: / Streets that follow like a tedious argument / Of insidious intent / To lead you to an overwhelming question . . . / Oh, do not ask, “What is it?” / Let us go and make our visit.’”“I’m in love with you,” he said quietly.“Augustus,” I said.“I am,” he said. He was staring at me, and I could see the corners of his eyes crinkling. “I’m in love with you, and I’m not in the business of denying myself the simple pleasure of saying true things. I’m in love with you, and I know that love is just a shout into the void, and that oblivion is inevitable, and that we’re all doomed and that there will come a day when all our labor has been returned to dust, and I know the sun will swallow the only earth we’ll ever have, and I am in love with you.”“Augustus,” I said again, not knowing what else to say. It felt like everything was rising up in me, like I was drowning in this weirdly painful joy, but I couldn’t say it back. I”

“JP shouted, "TELL THEM WHAT YOU JUST DID TO EACH OTHER!""Um," I said."We kissed," the Duke said."That's kinda gay," Keun said."I AM A GIRL.""Yeah, I know, but so is Tobin," Keun said.”