Brian B

“The tight ball of muck inside me—I opened it. I opened the shame, and it crumbled next to yours. This connection—the one I didn’t think we were going to have—let some of my muck go. And when it left my body, it evaporated into nothing. It had been living in me, but as soon as it was exposed, it disappeared.”
― Ashley Marie Berry, Separate Things: A Memoir

“Be yourself; everyone else is already taken.”
― Oscar Wilde

“Sometimes I fall asleep with my finger on your wrist pulse to try and steady my own heartbeat.”
― Ashley Marie Berry, Separate Things: A Memoir

“The hypomania is the good part. It’s freshly euphoric. This lift I was confusing with love was beau‐ tiful and nostalgic, and for the few hours a day we spent together, I was lost in you, with you.”
― Ashley Marie Berry, Separate Things: A Memoir