“Excuse me,” she said, her voice tight. “But if I’d known there was going to be a firearms examination at the end of the kidnapping, by God, I would have studied for it!”

“I can't help it. I'm just a big gasbag. I still got leftover barbeque gas." She squeezed her eyes shut tight and did a full minute-long far. "Excuse me," she said.”

“She looked up, her face pink as a Christmas ham. “You ever try chasing down a car?” she gasped. “I’ll one-up you. I gave Scott my hot dog and asked if he’d go to Summer Solstice with me.” “What does the hot dog have to do with anything?”“I said he’d be a wiener if he didn’t go with me.” Vee wheezed laughter. “I’d have run harder had I known I’d get to see you call him a wiener.”

“Cammie's going to be mad she missed this," Macey said to fill the silence."Excuse me?" Hale asked."Nothing." She shook her head. "I just... I have a friend who really likes air vents. And dumbwaiter shafts. And laundry chutes. Of course, the last time I was in a laundry chute, Cammie and I fell about a dozen stories...""Well, that sounds like fun.""It was either that or get kidnapped by terrorists, so I guess we got of easy.”

“Excuse me," she said politely. "But you can't have him. Not yet. He's going to come back with me.”

“If she[…] had known how much her first half-inch beginning to let go would take - and how long her noticing and renouncing owning and her turning her habits, and beginning the slimmest self-mastery whose end was nowhere in sight - would she have begun?”