“Every atom in me feels composed of lead. This is what dying is: a pull to the ground.”

“I am dying: it's a beautiful word. Like the long slow sigh of the cello: dying. But the sound of it is the only beautiful thing about it.”

“...it's stupid to be that way, so easily hurt; it's better to be like a plank of wood, an emotional mule. It's best not to feel,...best to have your nerve endings cauterized.”

“Life is lived on the inside. What's outside doesn't matter.”

“Justin is twenty-four years old: the world will never be more suited to him than it is now, he will never feel more embraced by life or have greater faith in his right to exist. The earth and the oxygen, the cities and lights, the nights and the beaches seem created for him and for those like him.”

“It is scary, sometimes, Tomas admitted. But the scary bits are what make you brave.”

“My life was pouring out my feet and seeping through cracks in the floor; yet still I knelt and did not move, for fear she'd let go my hands. Let me stay, I wanted to beg: Please don't make me go.”