“But hell would have to freeze over before I ever wore a dress.”

“She'll go to hell. They all will. If hell will even have them.”

“I gaze up at the ceiling. Through it. Past Kim and Chip's room on the second floor into the sky, space, heaven, hell. Who says hell is down? It could be up. It could be next door to heaven. Hell could be a subset of heaven, like a ghetto in the middle of a glass city.”

“I may be fat and ugly, but I'm not stupid. If anyone had ever gotten past my looks, they might've noticed I have a brain.”

“What was I afraid of, exactly? What other people would think? I guess, a little. But that wasn't what was stopping me from acting on my feelings. It was the intensity of them. The desire for her. I knew if I gave into it, I'd have to surrender myself completely. I'd lose all control. Everything I knew, everything I was, the walls I'd built up to protect myself all these years would come crashing down. I might get lost in the rubble. Yet, she made me feel alive in a way I'd only ever imagined I could feel. Bells, whistles, music.”

“Why are people so cruel? What did I ever do to them?”

“I knew right then and there nothing was ever going to change. It wouldn't matter if I was tall or short or fat or thin or absent every day. I was a loser from birth.”