“Fairy tales have rules. You are a princess or you aren’t. You are pure at heart or you aren’t. If you are pure at heart, or lucky, you might catch a break.”

“Vanity, in a fairy tale, will make you evil. Vanity in the real world will drive you nuts. Vanity makes you say things like “I deserved a better life than this.”

“For a while I thought I was the dragon.I guess I can tell you that now. And, for a while, I thought I was the princess,cotton candy pink, sitting there in my room, in the tower of the castle, young and beautiful and in love and waiting for you withconfidence but the princess looks into her mirror and only sees the princess,while I’m out here, slogging through the mud, breathing fire, and getting stabbed to death. Okay, so I’m the dragon. Big deal. You still get to be the hero.You get magic gloves! A fish that talks! You get eyes like flashlights!”

“You’re in a car with a beautiful boy, and he won’t tell you that he loves you, but he loves you. And you feel like you’ve done something terrible, like robbed a liquor store, or swallowed pills, or shoveled yourself a grave in the dirt, and you’re tired. You’re in a car with a beautiful boy, and you’re trying not to tell him that you love him, and you’re trying to choke down the feeling, and you’re trembling, but he reaches over and he touches you, like a prayer for which no words exist, and you feel your heart taking root in your body, like you’ve discovered something you didn’t even have a name for.”

“I'm battling monsters, I'm pulling you out of the burning buildings/ and you say I'll give you anything but you never come through.”

“The blond boy in the red trunks is holding your head underwater because he is trying to kill you, and you deserve it, you do, and you know this, and you are ready to die in this swimming pool because you wanted to touch his hands and lips and this means your life is over anyway. You’re in eighth grade. You know these things. You know how to ride a dirt bike, and you know how to do long division, and you know that a boy who likes boys is a dead boy, unless he keeps his mouth shut, which is what you didn't do, because you are weak and hollow and it doesn't matter anymore.”

“We can do anything. It’s not becauseour hearts are large, they’re not, it’s what westruggle with. The attempt to say Come over. Bringyour friends. It’s a potluck, I’m making pork chops, I’m makingthose long noodles you love so much.”