“I think they were afraid that some of us would try to kill ourselves or something because they looked very tense and one of them kept touching his beard.”

“Personally, I think they killed the bear because they were afraid of it. That s what people do, kill the things they re afraid of.”

“They were like adolescents, desperately afraid of surrendering the very attitudes they were trying to kill off.”

“Trayvon Martin’s killing touches on something universal. His death ought to make us look at ourselves and be honest: we need to realize that no one in America is safe until everyone is safe, that no one in America is a success until everyone is a success, that there is no more central a self-interest than the interests of all.”

“I stared hard, trying to find a pattern. Thinking if I kept looking hard enough, maybe the pieces of the world would fit back together into something I could understand.”

“No,” he said. “No, I’ll never wonder what it would be like to have sex with someone else for the same reason I don’t want to kiss anyone else. You’re the only girl I’ve ever touched. And I feel like it was supposed to be that way. I touch you and my whole body … rings. Like a bell or something. And I could touch other girls, and maybe there would be something, you know, like maybe there would be noise. But not like with you. And what would happen if I kept touching and touching them, and then … and then, I tried to touch you again? I might not be able to hear us anymore. I might not ring true.”