Elise

“Why did you make me want to live? Why did you do that to me?’
‘Because I wished it. Isn't that enough?’
‘Yes, it is enough. But if one day you didn't wish it. What should I do then? Suppose you took this happiness away when I wasn't looking …’
‘And lose my own? Who’d be so foolish?’
‘I am not used to happiness,’ she said. ‘It makes me afraid.’
‘Never be afraid. Or if you are tell no one.’
‘I understand. But trying does not help me.’
‘What would?’
She did not answer that, then one night whispered, ‘If I could die. Now, when I am happy. Would you do that? You wouldn't have to kill me. Say die and I will die. You don’t believe me? Then try, try, say die and watch me die.”
― Jean Rhys, Wide Sargasso Sea

“I will not be like a bird bred in a cage, I thought, too dull to fly even when the door stands open.”
― Madeline Miller, Circe

“When I was born, the word for what I was did not exist.”
― Madeline Miller, Circe

“I thought if I told no one it might not be true.”
― Jean Rhys, Wide Sargasso Sea