“She cried over the messed up messy mess of her life, over her parents' failures and her own shortcomings.”

“She had the scattered feeling she always got when events conspired to mess things up, and nothing exhausted and frustrated her more than a mess she was incapable of fixing.”

“There's something else there as well, something entirely her own. An ability to look into the confusing mess of life and see things for what they are.”

“There was something unmistakably exultant about the mess that Rosa had made. Her bedroom-studio was at once the canvas, journal, museum, and midden of her life. She did not “decorate” it; she infused it.”

“He likes you. You like him, you're just scared. Well," she glanced over her shoulder and dropped her voice, "unless you tell me he's some freaky psycho-killer..." I rolled my eyes and shook my head. "Then I'm not letting you mess this up for yourself. Your creepy hermit status is officially over.”

“She hated that he was here, messing up her life, making her want things she’d wanted for a long time, then pushed to the back of her mind, forcing herself to forget.She inhaled the scent of him. Big mistake, because God help her, she wanted to put her hands on him, and in that moment she realized the feelings she had for him weren’t dead.”