“There’s a time in everyone’s life when I’m sure they wonder if fate is actually some dude watching from beyond, just waiting for the right moment to fuck with us.”

“Like a stage magician, the con artist misdirects suspicion. While everyone’s watching for him to pull a rabbit out of a hat, he’s actually sawing a girl in half. You think he’s doing one trick when he’s actually doing another. You think that I’m dying, but I’m laughing at you.”

“Just wait, dude," Jamie had said. "I'm serious. It's fucking hard-core." Since Jamie described everything from zombie movies to his parents' fights to the new enchilada platter at Taco John's as "fucking hard-core," none of us could gauge much by it.”

“I mean obviously, staying alive is pretty fucking important . . . but there’s got to be something beyond that, right?”

“My mother says that some books are good no matter when you read them, and some are good at a particular moment; they come into your life at just the right time.”

“All you have to do is wait,” I explained. “Sit tight and wait for the right moment. Not try to change anything by force, just watch the drift of things. Make an effort to cast a fair eye on everything. If you do that, you just naturally know what to do. But everyone’s always too busy. They’re too talented, their schedules are too full. They’re too interested in themselves to think about what’s fair.”