“The only problem with him and Henry was they were like Charlie Brown and Lucy. The only difference was once in a while Henry would hold onto the football so Eddie could kick it--not often, but once in a while. Eddie had even thought, when in one of his heroin dazes, that he ought to write Charles Schultz a letter. Dear Mr. Schultz, he would say. You're missing a bet by ALWAYS having Lucy pull the football up at the last second. She ought to hold it down there once in a while. Nothing Charlie Brown could ever predict, you understand.Sometimes she'd maybe hold it down for him to kick three, even four times in a row, then nothing for a month, then once, and then nothing for three or four days, and then, you know, you get the idea. That would REALLY fuck the kid up, you know?”

“Love", I said, "is the rug they pull out from under you. Love is Lucy always lifting the football at the last second so that Charlie Brown falls on his ass. Love is something that every time you believe in it, it goes away. Love is for suckers, and I'm not going to be a sucker ever again.”

“Lucy: Do you think you have Pantophobia, Charlie Brown?Charlie: I don't know, what is pantophobia?Lucy: The fear of Everything.Charlie: THAT'S IT!!!”

“You know, there is only one letter's difference between lonely and lovely," I told him once when he was down. "There is only one letter's difference between loner and loser," he retorted.”

“The rest of it spilled out in an incoherent jumble, but he nodded every once in a while. I liked that about him. He was so smart you didn't have to hold his hand and walk him through everything. He could fill in the blanks on his own.”

“gazing down at the black water remembering all the stories of women who had thrown themselves into it. They'd done it for love, because that was the effect love had on you. It snuck up on you, it grabbed hold of you before you knew it, and then there was nothing you could do. Once you were in it- in love- you would be swept away, regardless. Or so the books had it.”