“Then, instead of telling her that where there was life there was hope, or to let a smile be her umbrella, or that it was always darkest just before the dawn, or anything else that had just lately fallen out of the dog's ass, she simply held her. Because sometimes only holding was best. That was one of the things she had taught that man whose last name she had taken for her own--that sometimes it was best to be quiet; sometimes it was best to just shut your everlasting mouth and hang on, hang on, hang on.”

“I had asked her for help, and she had sent me to the lions. I knew that she was trying to save her little girl, but sometimes mothers with the best intentions kill their daughters all the same.”

“She disapproved, but part of her seemed secretly to sympathize with the sickness. It was like she thought everybody had it, and the best you could do was to cover it up, and sometimes it would just come boiling out anyway. Then you had to point at it and condemn it, even though you knew you had it too.”

“Tina dropped her eyes. She hated this feeling. She wished she could tell the woman that her life hadn’t always been governed by this desperation. Once she had been a nice girl from the suburbs whose mother dropped her at the shops with friends and simply handed her twenty dollars for lunch. Once she had bought new clothes and seen the dentist every six months. Once she had thought that anyone living on the streets was obviously not trying hard enough. But once was a long time ago and the energy to try sometimes just ran out.”

“Lollipop had been her nickname for me as long as I could remember. I asked her how she came up with the name, and she told me sometimes kids are sweet, and sometimes they just need a good lickin'.”

“If I had learned anything by hanging out with her and her friends, it was that once you got up close to people, you realized that everyone - no matter how popular he or she might be - was just a living, breathing human being...”