Riley

“Sticks and stones may break my bones,
But words can also hurt me.
Stones and sticks break only skin,
while words are ghosts that haunt me.
Slant and curved the word-swords fall,
to pierce and stick inside me.
Bats and bricks may ache through bones,
But words can mortify me.
Pain from words has left its scar
on mind and heart that's tender.
Cuts and bruises now have healed,
it's words that I remember.”
― Barrie Wade

“With him, I am forever a night-blooming flower, attracted and repelled by the heat of the sun.”
― Holly Black, The Stolen Heir

“My greatest weakness has always been my desire for love. It is a yawning chasm within me, and the more that I reach for it, the more easily I am tricked. I am a walking bruise, an open sore. If Oak is masked, I am a face with all the skin ripped off. Over and over, I have told myself that I need to guard against my own yearnings, but that hasn’t worked.”
― Holly Black, The Stolen Heir

“I love you. I would die to protect you. I would make you hate me to keep you safe because damn it, Avery—some things are too precious to gamble.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, The Final Gambit