Price To Pay Quotes

“Have men and women always got to hurt each other this way?' cried Ralph.
'Yes. Anybody that ain't content with being a peddler is going to hurt himself and everybody else, I guess,' said Joe.”
― Sinclair Lewis, Mantrap

“The sun rose in the new Republic just as he was locked in his third-story cell. The window was not so high, and he could see the tiled roofs and bare-branched trees shimmering in the orange light, and the birds singing and gliding across the sky. This, the everlasting stillness of morning, brought him unbearable joy and sorrow. Tears flowed down his cheeks raked by time. Death was such a small price to pay for life.”
― Juhea Kim, Beasts of a Little Land

“Geno told them why I was there, and they all came down off the truck and looked me over — I guess just to make sure that they didn’t have any prior problems with me.
Geno was standing on my right side. He said to me, “Now I’m going to start it.” He took two steps out in front of me, spun around quickly, and delivered a punch to my left jaw. My head jerked back from his blow. I remember thinking to myself, at least that wasn’t bad. However, before I could register another thought, the five Truck Boys were on me like white on rice. They threw blows and slaps on me. For the next minute or so, I stood there and took it all in like a good soldier.
This was the price I was more than willing to pay to become a member of the Rebellions. After it was all over, they welcome me in with handshakes. Then they started asking me where I lived, and what school I had attended. Just like that I was now in the gang, these were my new best friends, individuals whom I would go all out for, and who would do the same for me.”
― Drexel Deal, The Fight of My Life is Wrapped Up in My Father

“There’s a price to be paid when you raise your daughter to be nice, and she’s not the only one who’s going to pay it. You’ll be right there beside her, trapped by inconvenience, inflexibility and double standards.”
― Gina Barreca

“Above, a vivid painting hung over the fireplace. Inside its frame, a woman was transforming into a tree.
The lower half of her body was bark and roots, plunging into soil, while her waist and chest arched upwards and her outstretched hands reached for the sky. The nymph's dark hair was a knotted mass of branches around her head, sprouting bright green leaves.
It was the myth of Daphne---the nymph who begged the river god to save her from Apollo and was turned into a laurel tree.
"It must be a terrible thing to lose," Hawthorne said, making her jump.
He looked up from where he crouched near the fire: to the woman in the frame. His left forearm was streaked with black ash.
"What's a terrible thing to lose?"
Hawthorne's eyes glittered as he studied the nymph. "Your humanity."
"But it was her choice," said Emeline, feeling defensive of Daphne. If the river god hadn't turned her into a laurel, she would have fallen prey to Apollo. "She asked to be saved."
Firelight flickered over Hawthorne's face as his gray-eyed gaze caught hers and held it.
"Saved," he murmured, considering this. "Is that really what the river god did? As a tree, her life is forfeit. She'll never be human again. She'll never laugh or sing, ponder or love, again. Don't you think she would have preferred the river god defeat Apollo, or at the very least warn him away, instead of taking something so precious from her?”
― Kristen Ciccarelli, Edgewood

“Everything in this world comes with a price. Somebody always has to pay.”
― Shawn K. Stout, The Impossible Destiny of Cutie Grackle

“He repeated that people had to pay for their past crimes. This is not a game, he said. It is a revolution... we all have to pay in the end. There are no innocents in the game of life, that's for sure.”
― Azar Nafisi, Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books