“I was making scrambled eggs smothered in Tabasco, his favorite, when he told me about Stephanie. The way she made him laugh. The way she understood him. The way they connected. I pictured the image of two Lego pieces fusing together, and I shuddered. It’s funny; when I think back to that morning, I can actually smell burned eggs and Tabasco. Had I known that this is what the end of my marriage would smell like, I would have made pancakes.”

“It's like I'm trying to put together a jigsaw puzzle, and everyone is hiding the pieces from me.”

“I buttoned my sweater against the wind on my skin - winds of change.”

“If I'd known he was going to die, my last words to him would have meant something. They certainly wouldn't have been my out-of-tune attempt at singing that old Grateful Dead song he loved so much. No, I would have told him how I felt about him, straight out. No more flirting, wild-eyed whispers in the grass outside. I would have looked at him harder to ensure his image was permanently seared in my mind. I'd have asked him a million more things so I could remember what mattered before I got in the car on the way home from Custard's. Because after, nothing mattered.”

“The definition of a true friend is not someone who swoops in when you're going through a rough patch. True friendship is when someone can appreciate your happiness - celebrate your happiness, even when she's not necessarily happy herself.”

“After several visits where I refused to speak, this psychiatrist asked me if I would at least agree to stop doing whatever it was I was doing that was bothering my parents so much. I agreed, knowing fully that I could do no such thing, I was not in control, was powerless, but agreeing to behave myself was my ticket to freedom. I never saw him again. He told my parents I would be better now, but never admitted defeat. How would it look, after all, if he was bested by a prepubescent girl? Looking back, I really feel like I refused to speak to him because I was afraid of what I might say if I opened my mouth or answered his questions without weeks of forethought put into my answers. I was afraid what I said would go straight back to my parents, and I am certain that is what would have happened. There is no way I would have been strong enough for that. And there is no way they would have handled it well.”

“He wasn't the type for displays of affection, either verbal or not. He was disgusted by couples that made out in the hallways between classes, and got annoyed at even the slightest sappy moments in movies. But I knew he cared about me: he just conveyed it more subtly, as concise with expressing this emotion as he was with everything else. It was in the way he'd put his hand on the small of my back, for instance, or how he'd smile at me when I said something that surprised him. Once I might have wanted more, but I'd come around to his way of thinking in the time we'd been together. And we were together, all the time. So he didn't have to prove how he felt about me. Like so much else, I should just know.”