Benny

“And that’s what they want, kid. For you to strive to be more like them and less like you. Sure, you’ll never be one of them, but the illusion is there so you’ll try to be. That’s their trap and it works every time. The more you try, the more misery you’ll generate, because it goes against human nature to be so dead inside.”
― Todd Keisling, The Smile Factory

“[...] feels gratitude, to the pages, for teaching him, already, that while it's okay to be scared, you've got to push back while you tremble.”
― Josh Malerman, Malorie

“Bunny crawls on hands and feet into the bathroom. Her limbs bend at acute angles as her writhing jaw juts forward […] Bunny crawls closer. Rose can just make out her form in the near-darkness. Bunny’s jaw snaps as if dislocating. Rose’s eyes trace the prominent bumps on Bunny’s back – vertebrae, which look disturbingly close to slicing her anorexic back.”
― S.E. Tolsen, Bunny

“He was still seen as weird.
If he was noticed at all.
[...]
Flipping through the book, reading page after page of spirits with names like djinn and stafie, he realized he wasn't the only one who didn't feel seen. That the world was filled with entities who were here but invisible, present but ignored.
[...]
She wouldn't understand that he sees ghosts as, no pun intended, kindred spirits. That when he opens The Giant Book and sees illustrations of all these scary, fantastical, misunderstood spirits, it feels like they could be the friends he lacks.”
― Riley Sager, Middle of the Night