“When you lie things become harder to grasp, but honesty will take you right to the thing you desire.”

“i'm gonna go upside down and backwards!”

“Frida Kahlo to Marty McConnellleaving is not enough; you muststay gone. train your heartlike a dog. change the lockseven on the house he’s nevervisited. you lucky, lucky girl.you have an apartmentjust your size. a bathtubfull of tea. a heart the sizeof Arizona, but not nearlyso arid. don’t wish awayyour cracked past, yourcrooked toes, your problemsare papier mache puppetsyou made or bought because the vendorat the market was so compelling you justhad to have them. you had to have him.and you did. and now you pull downthe bridge between your houses,you make him call beforehe visits, you take a loverfor granted, you takea lover who looks at youlike maybe you are magic. makethe first bottle you consumein this place a relic. place iton whatever altar you fashionwith a knife and five cranberries.don’t lose too much weight.stupid girls are always tryingto disappear as revenge. and youare not stupid. you loved a manwith more hands than a paradeof beggars, and here you stand. heartlike a four-poster bed. heart like a canvas.heart leaking something so strongthey can smell it in the street.”

“What they had was rare, imperfect and beautiful and scary all at once. It was hard to say those things out loud and know the right words to use. But that was okay. Because when two people found each other, two people who were meant to be, words didn't even matter anymore. They just knew. And that was the luckiest thing of all.”

“Have you thought about going insane?" It would seem like a reasonable thing to do, given his circumstances."Did once. Got boring, so I snapped out of it.”

“One inch at a time, that was how her father had taught her. You can't do anything but worry about the few inches right in front of you.”

“As far as I know, no vampires live in Antarctica.” “I’d have thought the long winter nights would be just the thing for you guys,” I said. “Perhaps. But the food supply is a bit wanting.”