Lauren

“I'm sorry you didn't get the help you needed.
You deserved a soft afghan wrapped around you,
People to hold your hands while you learned to walk again,
So stand with us now.”
― Laurie Halse Anderson, Shout

“We're all born to fight, but few are ever trained. Instead, they tell us
"Be nice.”
― Laurie Halse Anderson, Shout

“Some people grow up knowing what they want to do. They color inside the lines, study at the right school, check off the boxes, and in the end? They are handed the grown-up life they've dreamed of. (That's mostly bullshit for the record.) Trying to figure out what you want to do, who you want to be is messy as hell. The best anyone can hope for is to figure out the next step.”
― Laurie Halse Anderson, Shout

“Melinda's trick is looking hard in the mirror,
Absolving herself and cracking open doors to the next place.

But the girl at that school, so haunted,
smashed all the reflections
boarded up the windows and
bolted the doors,
forever stuck at 15 years old
judged to serve a life sentence for what they did.”
― Laurie Halse Anderson, Shout