Kate Esther

“I wish you had made me an enemy, I said, rather than yourself. Mothers, i thought, would be perfect for that role.

You can't be that for me, Mommy, Nikolai said. I've found a perfect enemy in myself.”
― Yiyun Li, Where Reasons End

“Get to know anyone and that’s what happens; they shed one layer of mystery after another, the dismal burlesque towards their inevitable ordinariness.”
― Colin Walsh, Kala

“To be a natural presence, you shouldn't take up too much space, which I always found easy at the beginning of a friendship. It felt nice to reshape myself into precisely the right format until the moment came, usually once I'd shrunk to my minimum size, when I got moody. I always have to be careful what I say around you, my friends would say. Or if I suddenly lost my temper over something that hadn't previously angered me, they'd say, I don't have enough space for this. Then I would know that my presence was no longer a given and it was all my fault -- it wasn't fair to pretend I was something other than who I really was, to keep shapeshifting like some kind of Barbapapa. I'm either too much or too little. I'm terrible at dispensing the right dose of myself.”
― Jente Posthuma, Waar ik liever niet aan denk

“I was an only child. My parents were both smart, but they were flighty, and they loved each other so much, more than they ever loved me. I had to do a lot for myself, from a young age. It wasn't great. Now I feel like my childhood is with me every day. Being alone. Being shut out. Some people, maybe they had a terrible time, maybe a great time, but it isn't with them. I feel like it's always with me. I'm never not there. Do you know what I mean? I mean - how about you?”
― Gwendoline Riley, Sick Notes