Iulia

“What are the chances you’d ever meet someone like that? he wondered. Someone you could love forever, someone who would forever love you back? And what did you do when that person was born half a world away? The math seemed impossible.”
― Rainbow Rowell, Eleanor & Park

“What do you want to show me?"

"Nothing, really. I just want to be alone with you for a minute."

He pulled her to the back of the driveway, where they were almost completely hidden by a line of trees and the RV and the garage.

"Seriously?" she said. "That was so lame."

"I know," he said, turning to her. "Next time, I'll just say, 'Eleanor, follow me down this dark alley, I want to kiss you.'"

She didn't roll her eyes. She took a breath, then closed her mouth. He was learning how to catch her off guard.

She pushed her hands deeper in her pockets, so he put his hands on her elbows. "Next time," he said, "I'll just say, 'Eleanor, duck behind these bushes with me, I'm going to lose my mind if I don't kiss you.'"

She didn't move, so he thought it was probably okay to touch her face. Her skin was as soft as it looked, white and smooth as freckled porcelain.

"I'll just say, 'Eleanor, follow me down this rabbit hole...'"

He laid his thumb on her lips to see if she'd pull away. She didn't. He leaned closer. He wanted to close his eyes, but he didn't trust her not to leave him standing there.”
― Rainbow Rowell, Eleanor & Park

“- Brother Jimmy, said Joey the Lips. - I'm worried. - About Dean.

- Wha' abou' Dean?

- He told me he's been listening to jazz.

- What's wrong with tha'? Jimmy wanted to know.

- Everything, said Joey the Lips. - Jazz is the antithesis of soul.

- I beg your fuckin' pardon!

- I'll go along with Joey there, said Mickah.

- See, said Joey the Lips. - Soul is the people's music. Ordinary people making music for ordinary people. - Simple music. Any Brother can play it. The Motown sound, it's simple. Thump-thump-thump-thump. - That's straight time. Thump-thump-thump-thump. - See? Soul is democratic, Jimmy. Anyone with a bin lid can play it. - It's the people's music.

- Yeh don't need anny honours in your Inter to play soul, isn't tha' wha' you're gettin' at, Joey?

- That's right, brother Michael.

- Mickah.

- Brother Mickah. That's right. You don't need a doctorate to be a doctor of soul.

- Nice one.

- An' what's wrong with jazz? Jimmy asked.

- Intellectual music, said Joey the Lips. - It's anti-people music. It's abstract.

- It's cold an' emotionless, amn't I righ'? said Mickah.

- You are. - It's got no soul. It is sound for the sake of sound. It has no meaning. - It's musical wanking, Brother.

- Musical wankin', said Mickah. - That's good.

- Here, yeh could play tha' at the Christmas parties.

- Instead o' musical chairs.”
― Roddy Doyle

“No, he is not tactful, yet have you ever noticed that there are people who do things which are most indelicate, and yet, at the same time, beautiful?”
― E.M. Forster, A Room with a View