Alice

“I am but paper. Brittle and thin. I am held up to the sun, and it shines right through me. I get written on, and I can never be used again. These scratches are a history. They’re a story. They tell things for others to read, but they only see the words, and not what the words are written upon. I am but paper, and though there are many like me, none are exactly the same. I am parched parchment. I have lines. I have holes. Get me wet, and I melt. Light me on fire, and I burn. Take me in hardened hands, and I crumple. I tear. I am but paper. Brittle and thin.”
― T.J. Klune, The House in the Cerulean Sea

“Thanks,” said Jesper, and looped his arm around the guard’s neck, applying pressure until his body went limp. Jesper slipped the leather strips from around his wrists, secured the guard’s hands behind his back, and stuffed the kerchief from his neck into the guard’s mouth. Then he rolled the body behind the altar. “Sleep well,” Jesper said. He felt bad for the guy. Not bad enough to wake him up and untie him, but still.”
― Leigh Bardugo, Crooked Kingdom

“While offenders were in fear of losing a small part of their privilege, the victims were running the risk of losing everything.”
― Cho Nam-Joo, Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982

“I wanted to tell them that I'd never had a friend, not ever, not a real one. Until Dante. I wanted to tell them that I never knew that people like Dante existed in the world, people who looked at the stars, and knew the mysteries of water, and knew enough to know that birds belonged to the heavens and weren't meant to be shot down from their graceful flights by mean and stupid boys. I wanted to tell them that he had changed my life and that I would never be the same, not ever. And that somehow it felt like it was Dante who had saved my life and not the other way around. I wanted to tell them that he was the first human being aside from my mother who had ever made me want to talk about the things that scared me. I wanted to tell them so many things and yet I didn't have the words. So I just stupidly repeated myself. "Dante's my friend.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe