Claudia

“How I admired people who talked about their vices as though they were distant relatives they'd learn to put up with because they couldn't quite disown them.”
― André Aciman, Call Me by Your Name

“What if it came and didn’t let go, a sorrow that had come to stay, and did to me what longing for him had done on those nights when it seemed there was something so essential missing from my life that it might as well have been missing from my body, so that losing him now would be like losing a hand you could spot in every picture of yourself around the house, but without which you couldn’t possibly be you again. You lose it, as you always knew you would, and were even prepared to; but you can’t bring yourself to live with the loss. And hoping not to think of it, like praying not to dream of it, hurts just the same.”
― André Aciman, Call Me by Your Name

“What did you write on the back of the postcard?”
“It was going to be a surprise.”
“I’m too old for surprises. Besides, surprises always come with a sharp edge that is meant to hurt. I don’t want to be hurt—not by you. Tell me.”
“Just two words.”
“Let me guess: If not later, when?”
“Two words, I said. Besides, that would be cruel.”
I thought for a while.
“I give up.”
“Cor cordium, heart of hearts, I’ve never said anything truer in my life to anyone.”
― André Aciman, Call Me by Your Name

“In your place, if there is pain, nurse it, and if there is a flame, don’t snuff it out, don’t be brutal with it. Withdrawal can be a terrible thing when it keeps us awake at night, and watching others forget us sooner than we’d want to be forgotten is no better. We rip out so much of ourselves to be cured of things faster than we should that we go bankrupt by the age of thirty and have less to offer each time we start with someone new. But to feel nothing so as not to feel anything — what a waste!”
― André Aciman, Call Me by Your Name