“She had s feeling the adults were going to let the kids do whatever they could think of short of murder and mayhem.She remembered a term from a program she had seen on television: plausible deniability. This way, if things went wrong somehow, the adults could all say they hadn't known about any of it.”

“She was right about one thing - I did need a caring, responsible adult around. If I could have cried on the shoulder of someone I trusted, I never would have stopped. Where were all the adults?”

“And yet she could not forgive herself. Even as an adult, she wished only that she could go back and change things: the ungainly things she’d worn, the insecurity she’d felt, all the innocent mistakes she made.”

“She couldn't be on his wavelength all the time. That's all. When you could recognize that and deal with it, you were on your way to an adult relationship.”

“Why is it that adults are always telling kids to go watch television as though we have nothing better to do?”

“She understood children, and knew that they were adults handicapped by a humiliating disguise and had their adult qualities within them.”