“I resist the urge to pump my fist. I’m not sure why, but I feel like I’ve just won some sort of competition worthy of headlines.”

“Sitting cross-legged on her bed, I watch her take out her gear. She’s been smoking so much the room stinks of it. Over the last few weeks, I’ve seen her do it so often I’ve resisted the urge. It’s surreal, like I’m watching me from outside my body. My willpower is fragile at the best of times, but my resolve is always weaker in the evening.I feel a dread and a revulsion for what I’m about to do, but there’s a stronger feeling, an unutterable longing. I crack.‘Give us a line,’ I say.”

“I wanted to wipe the grin off his face with a fist. I resisted the urge. Who says I have no self-control?”

“I’ve never felt like this for anyone. And I’m not really sure what falling in love feels like, but I think—I know I have. With you.”

“Why not stand up, pump your fists in the air, and scream like a maniac? -”

“I’m aware that there is a bigger, far more complicated world out there than I’d ever realized, and just like the students at Beijing University, I’ve glimpsed it only fleetingly, peripherally. I’ve sensed the vast expanse of my own ignorance now. I feel antsy and constricted and a deep, almost sexual yearning for velocity, for some sort of raw, transcendent experience that I cannot even begin to articulate.”