Caroline

“I make it a policy never to believe more than a third of what men tell me,”
― Kate Quinn, The Briar Club

“I am neither foe nor friend to my brothers, but such as each of them shall deserve of me. And to earn my love, my brothers must do more than to have been born. I do not grant my love without reason, nor to any chance passer-by who may wish to claim it. I honor men with my love. But honor is a thing to be earned.

I shall choose friends among men, but neither slaves nor masters. And I shall choose only such as please me, and them I shall love and respect, but neither command not obey.”
― Ayn Rand, Anthem

“I’ll manage,” Kim said. “All I need to know is that you’re with me today and will be here tomorrow. If I can have today and tomorrow on a rolling basis—” “Yes.”
― K.J. Charles, Subtle Blood

“It didn’t matter that the story had begun, because kathakali discovered long ago that the secret of the Great Stories is that they have no secrets. The Great Stories are the ones you have heard and want to hear again. The ones you can enter anywhere and inhabit comfortably. They don’t deceive you with thrills and trick endings. They don’t surprise you with the unforeseen. They are as familiar as the house you live in. Or the smell of your lover’s skin. You know how they end, yet you listen as though you don’t. In the way that although you know that one day you will die, you live as though you won’t. In the Great Stories you know who lives, who dies, who finds love, who doesn’t. And yet you want to know again.”
― Arundhati Roy, The God of Small Things