“I think it was only in that moment I believed she was dead, this girl I had never seen alive. I'll never be free of her. I wear her face; as I get older it'll stay her changing mirror, the one glimpse of all the ages she never had. I lived her life, for a few strange bright weeks; her blood went into making me what I am, the same way it went to make the bluebells and the hawthorn tree. But when I had the chance to take that final step over the border, lie down with Daniel among the ivy leaves and the sound of water, let go of my own life with all its scars and all its wreckage and start new, I turned it down.”

“Then all of a sudden, this tear plopped down on the checkerboard. On one of the red squares – boy, I can still see it. She just rubbed it into the board with her finger. I don't know why, but it bothered hell out of me. So what I did was, I went over and made her move over on the glider so that I could sit down next to her – I practically sat down in her lap, as a matter of fact. Then she really started to cry, and the next thing I knew, I was kissing her all over – anywhere – her eyes, her nose, her forehead, her eyebrows and all, her ears – her whole face except her mouth and all. She sort of wouldn't let me get to her mouth.”

“She repeated what her mother had told me, that she had been moved when she heard me playing as she passed the house. She had seen me on the street a few times, too, and begun to worship me. She actually used that word: worship. It made me turn bright red. I mean, to be 'worshiped' by such a beautiful little doll of a girl! I don't think it was an absolute lie, though. I was in my thirties already, of course, and I could never be as beautiful and bright as she was, and I had no special talent, but I must have had something that drew her to me, something that was missing in her, I would guess. Which must have been what got her interested in my to begin with. I believe that now, looking back. And I'm not boasting.”

“Sweet Grace amazes meThe way that she can seeBeyond the man I amTo the man that I could beShe's bringing out my bestWhile she covers all the restSome say her love is blindBut I say her love forgetsShe don't like it when I try so hard to impress her‘Cause when I do that, it's a lie that makes her love look the lesserThe truth is I knowI'll never be, I'll never be good enoughI'll never deserve her loveI'll never be, I'll never be good enough for GraceBut she takes me anywayI am the cheatin' kind But she's changing my mindThe way she takes me backThough I fail her every timeShe's got friends who tell her that sheIs much too good for meWell, I've told her that myselfBut she refuses to leaveI'd like to think my strength won her affectionBut the truth is it was my weakness that caught her attentionI'm grateful to knowWhen my tears fall down like rainShe wipes them from my faceShe tells me that I'm lovelyAnd if I am, it's all because of GraceThis love turns my inside outAnd my world upside downGrace is changing me”

“If I had to wish for something, just one thing, it would be that Hannah would never see Tate the way I did. Never see Tate's beautiful, lush hair turn brittle, her skin sallow, her teeth ruined by anything she could get her hands on that would make her forget. That Hannah would never count how many men there were, or how vile humans can be to one another. That she would never see the moments in my life that were full of neglect, and fear, and revulsion, moments I can never go back to because I know they will slow me down for the rest of my life if I let myself remember them for one moment. Tate, who had kept Hannah alive that night, reading her the story of Jem Finch and Mrs. Dubose. And suddenly I know I have to go. But this time without being chased by the Brigadier, without experiencing the kindness of a postman from Yass, and without taking along a Cadet who will change the way I breath for the rest of my life.”

“I'd never reacted to a girl this way before. My body was on fire when I was around Rose, and when I wasn't with her, all I did was think about her. Today had been the longest day of my life, dragging on forever until it was finally time to go meet her in the field.”