Anne Dean

“Her next words took me by surprise. I lay as still as I could, barely breathing, afraid that if I moved she would stop speaking her heart.
“My mom wanted six children. She only got me, and that sucks for her because I was a total weirdo.”
“You were not,” I said.
She twisted her head up to look at me.
“I used to line my lips in black eyeliner and sit cross-legged on the kitchen table … meditating.”
“Not that bad,” I said. “Crying out for attention.”
“Okay, when I was twelve I started writing letters to my birth mother because I wanted to be adopted.”
I shook my head. “Your childhood sucked, you wanted a new reality.”
She snorted air through her nose. “I thought a mermaid lived in my shower drain, and I used to call her Sarah and talk to her.”
“Active imagination,” I countered. She was becoming more insistent, her little body wriggling in my grip.
“I used to make paper out of dryer lint.”
“Nerdy.”
“I wanted to be one with nature, so I started boiling grass and drinking it with a little bit of dirt for sugar.”
I paused. “Okay, that’s weird.”
“Thank you!” she said. Then, she got serious again. “My mom just loved me through all of it.”
― Tarryn Fisher, Thief

“Just because he can't love you the way you want him to doesn't mean he does't love you with everything he has.' Liam says.”
― Anna Todd, After

“Real friends are the ones you can count on no matter what.
The ones who go into the forest to find you and bring you home.
And real friends never have to tell you that they’re your friends.”
― Morgan Matson, Since You've Been Gone

“God…” I choked on the word. “I know we haven’t talked much in the past few years. Hell, I told you I hated you when Tye took his own life.” I cursed again and pinched the bridge of my nose. “I don’t even care about myself anymore, just promise me she’ll be okay. If I don’t make it… if you take me, just let Kiersten be okay. She can’t go down that road — I don’t care if you have to punish me, God. If she’s going to suffer, give me her pain instead. If her heart’s going to break, break mine for hers. Please, God… please.”
― Rachel Van Dyken, Ruin