Ashley

“Yeah. I don’t talk about it. Ever. Even though I know what it was. But I’m so fucking scared sometimes, that if I say it out loud, someone’s going to tell me I’m wrong. Because it was someone close to me. Someone that I liked. Had feelings for. And we were drinking. And Lara said this, like, in one of our first classes, and it just haunts me. How some people drink, and do things, with people that they have feelings for. And they don’t wake up and regret it or hate themselves and feel like they want to die. They think it’s funny. I don’t understand that.”
― Haley Jakobson, Old Enough

“I had it in middle school, with this girl Raya,” Vera replied. “It was kind of fucked up.” My shoulders tensed. I pushed a fry around in the dregs of my ketchup. “Why do you think that?” I asked. “Um, it was really intense, I think. Too intense. And the whole thing kind of blew up. It actually really hurt. I still think about her sometimes.” “I’m sorry,” I said. “Yeah.” Vera nodded. “Thanks. It’s a lot to promise, you know? That you’re gonna be in the same friendship for your whole life.” “We do that romantically, though,” Candace said. “I mean, that’s the basic idea, if you believe in marriage and stuff.” “Yeah, but that feels different,” Vera argued. “You go into a romantic relationship knowing it can completely combust and leave you wrecked. You basically sign up for that. I feel like friends don’t talk about that happening.”
― Haley Jakobson, Old Enough

“Who says no to karaoke?” “Only the worst people.”
― Haley Jakobson, Old Enough

“a kind of “I’m-married-to-myself” fuck-you to the patriarchy. I hated that word now, “patriarchy.” All I could think of were overpriced graphic tees and white liberal mothers on Facebook updating their status to “WE’RE STILL WITH HER” and “PANTSUIT NATION!”
― Haley Jakobson, Old Enough