“I stopped and listened. But all I could hear was.. a kind of thudding, and not in me but somewhere near me... my heart.”

“God! Molly, will you just stop and listen to me?" he begged, trying to wrap himself around me again.I pushed him away. "What could you possibly say that I'd want to hear?" I demanded, slapping his lying arms away."I love you," he pleaded.And it broke my heart into a thousand tiny pieces. Because it was only now, when I knew that I could never stand to be near him again, that he was telling me what I'd always wanted to hear.”

“My heart nearly stopped. I could feel my pores open to release what sweat I had left.”

“I listened to them fade away till all I could hear was my memory of the sound.”

“I want a place. It has to do with the kind of person I want to be. And how I fit in to everything. I want people to listen when I open my mouth. And know I'm worth listening to."She stared at me. "That's all?"To me it was not all, it was everything.”

“Some days, I listen to that clock ticking in the hallway. Then I think of all the ticks, all the minutes, all the hours and days and weeks and months and years waiting for me. All of it without you. And I can’t breathe then, like someone’s stepping on my heart. I get so weak. So weak I just want to collapse somewhere.”