Chloe

“Let me die the moment my love dies.
Let me not outlive my own capacity to love.
Let me die still loving, and so, never die.”
― Mary Zimmerman, Metamorphoses

“The scullery roof had sprung a leak: she put down a bowl to catch the drips, but the rainwater spread and darkened, to make treasure maps and Whistler nocturnes of the walls and ceiling.”
― Sarah Waters, The Paying Guests

“Big production, no story, as they say around the movie lots. I guess Sylvia is happy enough, though not necessarily with me. In our circle that's not too important. There's always something to do if you don't have to work or consider the cost. It's no real fun, but the rich don't know that. They never had any. They never want anything very hard except maybe somebody else's wife and that's a pretty pale desire compared to the way a plumber's wife wants new curtains for the living room.”
― Raymond Chandler "The Long Goodbye"

“Sir, what is a pearl?"
"My worthy Ned," I answered, "to the poet, a pearl is a tear of the sea; to the Orientals, it is a drop of dew solidified; to the ladies, it is a jewel of an oblong shape, of a brilliancy of mother-of-pearl substance, which they wear on their fingers, their necks, or their ears; for the chemist, it is a mixture of phosphate and carbonate of lime, with a little gelatine; and lastly, for naturalists, it is simple a morbid secretion of the organ that produces the mother-of-pearl among certain bivalves.”
― Jules Verne