“How did the world ever manage without me before I was born?' he wondered. 'Didn't they feel something was missing?”

“I wondered if she knew that everything she said made the other person feel like an idiot. I wondered if it was something she'd actually cultivated deliberately. I didn't think I could ever manage to make someone feel inferior.”

“Thank God for tea! What would the world do without tea! How did it exist? I am glad I was not born before tea.”

“The artist brings something into the world that didn't exist before, and he does it without destroying something else. ”

“He hesitates only a moment before pulling me close, arms tightening around me, mouth meeting mine the same way it did before. Purely, sweetly, wickedly, perfectly. He sighs against my lips, a sound of such relief it echoes through my skin, making me smile and our teeth bump together. I know exactly how he feels. How it feels to come home, to find sanctuary, to be handed that missing piece that makes life not something to be endured, but something to be celebrated.”

“I spent the best years of my life atoning for something I didn't do, something my parents didn't do, something done just about before I was ever even born. I got no complaints with that, but I'm about all atoned out, and I ain't yet gotten round to atoning for the things I did do.”