“He lit another cigarette and inhaled deeply, the tip flaring an angry red. “Isn’t love a beautiful goddamn liar?”

“He and I had already had our time, and though it was still very close and real to me, as beautiful and poignant as any place on a map, it was, in truth, another time—another country.”

“There was only today to throw yourself into without thinking about tomorrow, let alone forever. To keep you from thinking, there was liquor, an ocean's worth at least, all the usual vices and plenty of rope to hang yourself with.Love is a beautiful liar.”

“Maybe happiness was an hourglass already running out, the grains tipping, sifting past each other. Maybe it was a state of mind.”

“This was my one brush with love. Was it love? It felt awful enough. I spent another two years crawling around in the skin of it, smoking too much and growing too thin and having stray thoughts of jumping from my balcony like a tortured heroine in a Russian novel.”

“He didn't know how love managed to be a garden one moment and war the next.”

“I knew that I could hate him all I wanted for the way he was hurting me, but I couldn’t ever stop loving him, absolutely, for what he was.”