theodore

“Because you deserve to be known, in whatever capacity you wish. I am trying to become a person who deserves to know you. I want that more than anything.”
― Nina Varela, Iron Heart

“She had never really seen a pair of eyes like this. It was like standing in the doorway to a dark room, like balancing on a threshold, holding a lantern up and watching how it kissed some things gold and left other things in shadow. It was the kind of dark that hid and held a lot of things. A hot fluid dark, a summer tide pool dark, a wild breathless dark.”
― Nina Varela, Crier's War

“Crier wanted to study her like a map. Draw an easy path between all the specific yet scattered points of her.”
― Nina Varela, Crier's War

“There’s this idea in psychoanalysis that I’ve always liked.” Julian pulled himself closer and rested his head in the crook of Paul’s arm. “It’s that what we call ‘love’ is actually letting your identity fill in around the shape of the other person—you love someone by defining yourself against them. It says loss hurts because there’s nothing holding that part of you in place anymore. But your outline still holds, and it keeps holding. The thing you shaped yourself into by loving them, you never stop being that. The marks are permanent, so the idea of the person you loved is permanent, too.”
― Micah Nemerever, These Violent Delights