“Safe, I decided, didn't leave much room for fun.”

“I didn't know that the world could be so mind-blowingly beautiful.”

“Teachers wondered why I didn't speak up more in class. Why would I when I knew how precarious words could be, how betraying they were, how vulnerable they made you?”

“I didn't have the language to communicate that to this little girl -- or to communicate that beauty -- real everlasting beauty -- lives not on our faces, but in our attitude and our actions. It lives in what we do for ourselves and for others.”

“By the time I slip back to my room, it's almost six. Jasmine is in bed, awake and waiting for me..."Where were you?"Where was I? Chased by a fat guard, hit by a laugh attack and nearly thrown out of Stanford University Math Camp, never to see the light of the campus ever again, and certainly not as a future student.”

“But even quashed rebellions leave us different. Because freedom may be a forbidden fruit in tyrannies, but once tasted, it is unforgettable.”

“And then there was Jacob, who stepped closer to me and then waited, letting me decide whether I would take the next step. Balanced there in indecision, it was as if the Twisted Sisters were before me, shaking their pom-poms, asking: But what is fair about staying with a guy who is ashamed to be seen with you? What was so miraculous about a relationship that was based more on my gratitude than mutual respect.”