Monica

“I wish I could be better for you." She looks over at me, and I duck my head, shame sinking its teeth in. "I'm older and I know I'm supposed to be... an example, I don't know. At least someone you aren't embarrassed of." "You do fine." "I don't." "You're right, you don't. But you're getting better. And that isn't nothing.”
― Mackenzi Lee, The Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue

“I have spent so long building up my fortress and learning to tend it all myself, because if I didn’t feel I needed anyone, then I wouldn’t miss them if they weren’t there. I couldn’t be neglected if I was everything to myself.”
― Mackenzi Lee, The Lady's Guide to Petticoats and Piracy

“I love you, but I don’t know how to help you. I still don’t! I’m an emotional delinquent and I say wrong things all the time, but I want to be better for you. I promise that. It doesn’t matter to me that you’re ill and it doesn’t matter if I have to give up everything, because you’re worth it. You’re worth it all because you are magnificent, you are. Magnificent and gorgeous and brilliant and kind and good and I just . . . love you, Percy. I love you so damn much.”
― Mackenzi Lee, The Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue

“You're trying to play a game designed by men. You'll never win, because the deck is stacked and marked, and also you've been blindfolded and set on fire. You can work hard and believe in yourself and be the smartest person in the room and you'll still get beat by the boys who haven't two cents to rub together. So if you can't win the game, you have to cheat. You operate outside the walls they've built to fence you in. You rob them in the dark, while they're drunk on spirits you offered them. Poison their waters and drink only wine.”
― Mackenzi Lee, The Lady's Guide to Petticoats and Piracy