“I only had the right to sit in the shadows of the world,in complete silence. Whether I was laughed at, or told I was discusting, or thought of as unpleasant I would sit in the shadows.”

“Even now I steal outdoors in the dead of night to sit on the tree swing and watch the shadows breathe in the moonlight.”

“Mother Mary," he breathes. "How you shine." I shake my head. "The light is yours. Right now you can't see it because you sit in shadow, but all I do is reflect you.”

“Perhaps there are other bits of my life that would take on content, take on shadow, if only I read more and thought less about money.”

“I thought the most beautiful thing in the world must be shadow, the million moving shapes and cul-de-sacs of shadow. There was shadow in bureau drawers and closets and suitcases, and shadow under houses and trees and stones, and shadow at the back of people's eyes and smiles, and shadow, miles and miles and miles of it, on the night side of the earth.”

“I love being a pavement artist; seriously, I do. It's like when guys who would normally hate being freakishly tall discover basketball, or when girls with abnormally long fingers sit down at a piano. Blending in, going unseen, being a shadow in the sun is what I'm good at. Seeing the shadows, it turns out, is not my natural gift.”