“I could be worse, you know.""How?" I asked, teasing. "I mean, I have a work of calligraphy over my toilet that reads, 'Bathe yourself in the comfort of God's words,' Hazel. I could be way worse.""Sounds unsanitary," I said.”

“Hazel Grace,” he said.“Hi,” I said. “How are you?”“Grand,” he said. “I have been wanting to call you on a nearly minutely basis, but I have been waiting until I could form a coherent thought in re An Imperial Affliction.” (He said “in re.” He really did. That boy.)”

“Wow,” I said. “Are you making this up?”“Hazel Grace, could I, with my meager intellectual capacities, make up a letter from Peter Van Houten featuring phrases like ‘our triumphantly digitized contemporaneity’?”“You could not,” I allowed. “Can I, can I have the email address?”“Of course,” Augustus said, like it was not the best gift ever.”

“Walt Whitman is HOT! I mean, that guy could sound his barbaric yawps over the roofs of my world any time.”

“You know what's lame, Pudge? I really care about her. I mean, we were hopeless. Badly matched. But still. I mean, I said I loved her... I mean, it's stupid to miss someone you didn't even get along with. but I don't know, it was nice, you know, having someone you could always fight with.”

“Hazel Grace,” he said, my name new and better in his voice. “It has been a real pleasure to make your acquaintance.”“Ditto, Mr. Waters,” I said. I felt shy looking at him. I could not match the intensity of his waterblue eyes.“May I see you again?” he asked. There was an endearing nervousness in his voice.I smiled. “Sure.”“Tomorrow?” he asked.“Patience, grasshopper,” I counseled. “You don’t want to seem overeager.”“Right, that’s why I said tomorrow,” he said. “I want to see you again tonight. But I’m willing to wait all night and much of tomorrow.” I rolled my eyes. “I’m serious,” he said.“You don’t even know me,” I said. I grabbed the book from the center console. “How about I call you when I finish this?”“But you don’t even have my phone number,” he said.“I strongly suspect you wrote it in the book.”He broke out into that goofy smile. “And you say we don’t know each other.”

“I tried to tell myself that it could be worse, that the world was not a wish-granting factory, that I was living with cancer not dying of it, that I mustn't let it kill me before it kills me,...”