Vrushali Pathak

“Words are things. You must be careful, careful about calling people out of their names, using racial pejoratives and sexual pejoratives and all that ignorance. Don’t do that. Some day we’ll be able to measure the power of words. I think they are things. They get on the walls. They get in your wallpaper. They get in your rugs, in your upholstery, and your clothes, and finally in to you.”
― Maya Angelou

“What am I doing here?
I haven't talked to my dad in two days. He's probably moved from worry to sheer panic because I haven't come home. And maybe he's right to be afraid. Maybe I should be more afraid. I had sex with a guy I barely know. Followed him into the middle of nowhere because of it. Even after I found out about the gun. Even after Lindsey didn't go home. He swears he won't hurt me, but his past tells a different, violent story, and I don't know what to believe. I rationalized everything, telling myself that I earned this time away from home. But now, with too much time to do nothing but think, I wonder if I was just plain selfish. Just . . . stupid.”
― Trish Doller, The Devil You Know

“How do I know you're not the devil?" I whisper to Noah, my lips touching his. I can feel his smile against my mouth, even in the dark.
"Better the devil you know than the devil you don't," he whispers in reply as his fingers tiptoe up my back.”
― Trish Doller, The Devil You Know

“War must be, while we defend our lives against a destroyer who would devour all; but I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Two Towers