“DOES THIS STRAITJACKET MAKE MY BUTT LOOK BIG?”

“Mmm, butt bagels." Elody reaches into the bag and pulls out a bagel, half squashed, then makes a big deal of taking an enormous bite out of it. "Taste like Victoria's Secret.""Taste like thong floss," I say."Taste like crack," Lindsay says."Taste like fart," Elody says, and Lindsay spits coffee on the dashboard, and I start laughing and can't stop, and all the way to school we're thinking of flavors for butt bagels, and I'm thinking that this---my life, my friends---might be weird or screwy or imperfect or damaged or whatever, but it's never seemed better to me.”

“Everything looks beautiful. The Book of Shhh says that deliria alters your perception, disables your ability to reason clearly, impairs you from making sound judgments. But it does not tell you this: that love will turn the whole world into something greater than itself.”

“...if you are one tardy away from missing out on a big competition, you should probably make your coffee at home.”

“It's a bummer in some ways, since she never surprises me by making up my sheets anymore, or leaving folded laundry or a new sundress on my bed like she did when I was in middle school. But at least I know she's not rooting through my drawers while I'm at school, looking for drugs or sex toys or whatever.”

“..in that moment i realize how much i love the little everyday routines of my life..the details that are my life's special pattern, like how in handwoven rugs what really makes them unique are the tiny flaws in the stitching, little gaps and jumps and stutters that can never be reproduced. so many things become beautiful when you really look.”

“Here are the top three things I’ve learned in my twenty-two years on the planet:1. Never wipe your butt with poison ivy.2. People are like ants: Just a few of them give all the orders. And most of them spend their lives getting squashed.3. There are no happy endings, only breaks in the regular action.Of all of them, number three is really the only one you have to keep in mind”