Rea

“I didn't return Mabel's nine hundred texts because I knew we'd end up like this no matter what. What happened had broken us even if it wasn't about us at all. Because I know that for all her care and understanding, when this visit is over and she's back in LA with Jacob and her new friends, sitting in her lecture halls or riding the Ferris wheel in Santa Monica or eating dinner by herself in front of an open textbook, she'll be the same as she's always been - fearless and funny and whole. She'll still be herself and I'll be learning who I am now.”
― Nina LaCour, We Are Okay

“At night, I’d sit in bed and say to myself, “Everyone leaves. You’ll be okay. Everyone leaves. You’ll be okay.” I’d say it over and over until I could picture them leaving, until I could feel the tears on my cheeks. When I cried, I thought I could feel some of that inevitable pain, sparing my future self. It burned right in the center of me, and rolled my gut, but it kept my heart right where I thought it should be: inaccessible past a certain point. I did not mind getting hurt as much as I minded being surprised by the pain. I wanted to see it coming.”
― Ashley C. Ford, Somebody's Daughter

“None of this dirt is yours, I told her. You’re as clean as rain. She kissed me, but on the forehead this time.”
― Emma Donoghue, The Pull of the Stars

“I tried not to think of what had happened to me. Most of the day, I could succeed in that mission. Then, a shock of ice-cold air on the wrong side of my face. The rattle of plastic meal trays against the hard metal counter during breakfast and lunch. Feeling too sad, or feeling surrounded, and I would be back on the roof of the shed, looking down at myself, pathetic and mumbling nonsense. I hated that place. I hated everything in my view, including the ball of rotten nothing called my body curled into itself on the floor. Why didn’t she get up? Why didn’t she go away? She never should have been there at all. Staring down at myself, I admonished her, blamed her, and only spoke enough to say, “Stop bothering me. Stop bringing me back here. We don’t belong to each other anymore. You made the choice to go in there. Now you can stay there.”
― Ashley C. Ford, Somebody's Daughter