“I start to back away before I do something wildly inappropriate, like jump on top of him.”

“This is not what I wantef. This is not why I came to the Wilds, why Alex wanted me to come: not to turn my back and bury the people I care about, and build myself hard and careless on top of their bodies, as Raven does. This is what Zombies do.”

“it occurs to me that there is so much I never knew about him--his past, his role in the resistance, what his life was like in the Wilds, before he came to Portland, and I feel a flash of grief so intense it almost makes me cry out: not for what I lost, but for the chances I missed.”

“Time jumps. It leaps. It pours away like water through fingers.”

“—And you completely blow me away and rip my world up and everything else, and then you go back to ignoring me.” “I blew you away?” I squeak out before I can stop myself. He stares at me steadily. “You blew everything away.”

“I guess that's what saying good-bye is always like--like jumping off an edge. The worst part is making the choice to do it. Once you're in the air, there's nothing you can do but let go.”

“I get that rush that comes when you know you're doing something wrong and are getting away with it, like stealing from the school cafeteria of getting tipsy at a family holiday without anyone knowing it.”