“Can you even understand what a beautiful life is? It isn’t about the perfect house and a keeping-up-with-the-Jones’s new car every two years and having the right landscaper and bragging at parties that you have a house cleaner. Not when all that stuff is shit. It’s surface. There’s nothing underneath.”

“... it isn’t the kids who have two parents and a stable home who are the luckiest ones. It’s the kids who know the taste of shit because they’ve been eatin’ it all their lives and then someone finds them and offers them a taste of somethin’ sweeter and they learn that life can be good. They learn to trust. They learn that if you care about someone you put your ass on the line to keep them safe. They learn that love doesn’t come with conditions.”

“He’s good at this stuff.”“What stuff?”“Relationship stuff. He’s a natural. It’s weird, we’re new and we’re old. I can’t get my head around it.”“He’s shit at relationship stuff. He’s only good at it because it’s you.”“Sorry?”“You’re shit at it too, but only because it was never him.”

“His eyes sliced to me and he clipped, “Stop that shit.” “What shit?” I asked “The cold, remote Faye. It’s shit,” he answered. “You’re right. It is. It’s a façade to hide the fact my heart is breaking. But, whatever. That isn’t your problem anymore. Now, can I point out, you told me you need space but you’re still fraking here?”

“For what it’s worth, I’ll share my intentions. You and me, we aren’t practice for the real thing. It isn’t that too much is at stake with family and friends, it’s because I love you. You’re funny, beautiful and you care about people. I like the way you look at me, especially when you think I don’t notice it. I like that we have history and our kids will have a big family and share that history because there was never a time when their Mom and Dad weren’t together. If you were a terrible lay, I might have second thoughts but you and I are dynamite together. I intend to marry you and spend the rest of my life with you. If that freaks you out, tough, because now we’ve started this, there’s no goin’ back.”

“You got a girl who’s worth it … you spoil her rotten. You let her know she’s precious, not convince her of that shit, because it’s not about convincing. It’s about understanding it’s just fuckin’ true.”

“There are very few, very fuckin' few people, Kia, who get what's precious in this world. They work their asses off for pure shit and think they'd fight and die to keep it. You don't fight and die for shit. You fight and die for things that matter. You are the first woman I've met outside a life that leads you to understand that shit who gets that. And straight up, baby, you gotta know, I like that a fuckuva lot.”