“If optimism is the highest form of courage -- as I am beginning to believe it is -- then these students are all heroes.”

“Tonight I write this journal entry on my laptop. Other nights I have handwritten entries in notebooks. Sometimes I jot down notes as I ride home in the cab or wait for an appointment. I want all of this -- everything and everyone -- to stay with me.”

“Sometimes I wish we could rub out all of our mistakes and start fresh, from the beginning,' I said. 'And sometimes I think there isn't anything to us but our mistakes.”

“I can't help but notice that...well, you're in my life...at our house, with my family, in my world. But am I really in yours?....”

“I think back to Kristen’s musings about the nature of existence … nonexistence. Her wonder about who and what her baby was before it was conceived. Now I wonder the same thing. Who was I before I existed. Who am I now that I no longer do?”

“Well, Samantha... you were introduced to this guy. It went downhill from there. That might make it justifiable homicide. From time to time, I've wanted to kill people I knew even less well... strangers in supermarkets." Am I on my roof with a psychopath?”

“You okay? This okay?" I nod, pulling his hips more tightly to my own."Now we'll make it better," Jase vows, and begins to kiss me again as he starts to move in a rhythm. My body follows, unwilling to let him go, already glad to have him come back.”