“What would you rather have?""Cheeseburger and a small fry. Coke classic. Better yet, dope classic.""Sure. I'll take a milkshake. What's the special flavor this week, chocolate Jack Daniels?""Strawberry scotch.""Stick one of those paper umbrellas in mine.""Shove a syringe in mine. And a plastic tombstone. RIP, baby. He was born a rock star. He died a junkie.""Rock in peace."[...]"He wanted the world and lost his soul. [...] Sold it all for rock and roll. Lost his heart in a needle. Found his life in the grave. The road to hell is paved in marijuana leaves. Now he rocks in peace.”

“Mitch---""All right, baby, I'll shut you up."Then he did, his head slanting and his lips taking mine in a repeat performance of the open-mouthed, knock my socks off, rock my world, best kiss in the history of all time.”

“You fuckin' rock, baby," he murmured."You rock at fuckin', baby.”

“I watch Stewart. He has the most interesting face. It is beautiful, young, almost childlike, and yet with a power and authority in his features. In another time he would have been a young warrior, a Lost Prince exiled from his kingdom. But he's from this time, this place, so he's just some "at risk" kid who can't find a place for himself in the straight world.”

“If he survived Roaming Rock, he kept telling himself, death would have lost its sting.”

“He died last year. He had endured that life for six years. He was found one morning on the mountainside lying quite peacefully as though he had died in his sleep. From where he lay he had been able to see those two great rocks called the Faraglioni which stand out of the sea. It was full moon and he must have gone to see them by moonlight. Perhaps he died of the beauty of that sight.”

“He held my hand and told me a story about when he was six and threw a rock at a kid's head who was bullying his brother, and how after that no one had bothered either of them again. 'You have to stick up for yourself,' he told me. 'But it's bad to throw rocks,' I said. 'I know. You're smarter than me. You'll find something better than rocks.”