“I'm pretty sure my parents arepretending they are sick.I know because I taught them bothto do that little trick. You blow your nose and hold your headand claim your brain is breaking.And so, a pro like me would knowmy folks are clearly faking.A little thing I learned in schoolconvinced me I am right.My parents are supposed to meetmy principal tonight.”

“So now I'm thinking about it. I'm imagining sitting down with my parents and actually saying, "I'm gay." And you know what? It makes me a little mad. I mean, straight guys don't have to sit their parents down and tell them they like girls.”

“I do not think God makes bad things happen just so that people can grow spiritually. Bad parents do that, my mother said. Bad parents make things hard and painful for their children and then say it was to help them grow. Growing and living are hard enough already; children do not need things to be harder. I think this is true even for normal children. I have watched little children learning to walk; they all struggle and fall down many times. Their faces show that it is not easy. It would be stupid to tie bricks on them to make it harder. If that is true for learning to walk, then I think it is true for other growing and learning as well. God is suppose to be the good parent, the Father. So I think God would not make things harder than they are. I do not think I am autistic because God thought my parents needed a challenge or I needed a challenge. I think it is like if I were a baby and a rock fell on me and broke my leg. Whatever caused it was an accident. God did not prevent the accident, but He did not cause it, either.... I think my autism is an accident, but what I do with it is me.”

“It's been nice knowing you, Clara.'Huh? My brain still a bit shell-shocked.'Say a prayer for me, will you? He gives me a shaky grin. Because I'm pretty sure my parents are going to kill me”

“Sky, I'm not kissing you tonight but believe me when I tell you, I've never wanted to kiss a girl more. So stop thinking I'm not attracted to you because you have no idea just how much I am. You can hold my hand, you can run your fingers through my hair, you can straddle me while I feed you spaghetti, but you are not getting kissed tonight. And probably not tomorrow, either. I need this. I need to know for sure that you're feeling every single thing that I'm feeling the moment my lips touch yours. Because I want your first kiss to be the best first kiss in the history of first kisses.”

“While I'm sure this is going to be a fascinating story,' I interrupted. 'I don't care. I'm having a major parental crisis that sort of outshines your little tantrum, and frankly it seems like my dad agrees with you. I have a party to get ready for, can we do this later?”