“What good did it do to light the world on fire if she had to watch the glow alone?”

“This time I really am going to light the world on fire,' she said, laughing. 'I finally have a fucking match.”

“But it had gotten so boring, all that crying and wanting and needing. This year she'd realized that she'd never be like her mom, and the realization had freed her. She stopped trying to get good grades and make good friends, and do everything well. She had flourished in her rebellion, reveled in it.”

“She had been ready to love this man from the moment she first saw him. In all these years, that had never changed. They'd hurt each other, let each other down, and yet, here they were after everything, together. She needed him now, needed him to remind her that she was live, that she wasn't alone, that she hadn't lost everything.”

“She pouted prettily, and he wondered if that was one of the things they taught wealthy young girls at schools like Miss Porter's. If not, it had been passed down from one generation to another as carefully as the secret of fire.”

“It was the Magic Hour, the moment in time when every leaf and blade of grass seemed to separate, when sunlight, burnished by the rain and softened by the coming night, gave the world an impossibly beautiful glow.”

“That was the one thing she knew now. Some chances came and went, and if you missed them, you could spend the rest of your life standing alone, waiting for an opportunity that had already passed you by.”