Elizabeth > Recent Status Updates

“No one should marry the person who makes them happy. Marry the person you want by your side at your lowest p-point. Marry the person you…you never get sick of. Who you always want more from. Who makes you proud to be theirs.”

“A best friend is the person who can call you at any hour and say, ‘I have all this bullshit happening in my life and I need you to listen to me vent about it.’ And the other person is supposed to unconditionally respond, ‘That is bullshit and you’re right’ and then offer to fight someone.”

“Okay, but the upside of a massive failure—”
“I thought ‘it’s a high-risk industry.’ ”
“—is that you have the opportunity for a redemption arc.” She leans forward. “Give people a reason to root for you. This is your Reputation phase: messy as fuck, but more interesting than just being successful.”

“Your soulmate gives you the greatest possible sense of belonging,” he says with genuine conviction. “They heal your existential wound. It’s the basis of modern love.”

“For what it’s worth,” he says, “I doubt I will ever like anyone else in the world as much as I like you.”

“I feel an uncanny ache. This is what looking at Charlie is like sometimes. Like a gut-punch of a sentence, like a line so sharp you have to set the book aside to catch your breath.”

“…if you’re the ‘wrong kind of woman,’ then I’m the wrong kind of man.”

“When you care about something, you won’t let anything fucking touch it. I’ve never met anyone who cares as much as you do. Do you know what most people would give to have someone like that in their life?” His eyes are dark, probing, his heartbeat fast. “Do you know how fucking lucky anyone you care about is?”

“Is there anything better than iced coffee and a bookstore on a sunny day? I mean, aside from hot coffee and a bookstore on a rainy day.”

“You said she’s trying to give you your own small-town romance novel,” he says wryly. “You know how those books end, don’t you, Nora? With a big wedding inside of a barn, or an epilogue involving babies.”

“You can afford to be all surly and sharp and people will admire you for it. The rules are different for women. You have to strike this perfect balance to be taken seriously but not seen as bitchy. It’s a constant effort. People don’t want to work with sharky women—”

“Or maybe, Nora Stephens, I can read you like a book.”

“What did this phone do to you?”
“It’s not the phone so much as the sociopathic super-bitch who lives inside it.”
Charlie says, “Most people just call her Siri.”

“That’s the thing about women. There’s no good way to be one. Wear your emotions on your sleeve and you’re hysterical. Keep them tucked away where your boyfriend doesn’t have to tend to them and you’re a heartless bitch.”

“Stop that.”
“Stop what?”
“Being so emotionally balanced!” 🤣

“I can appreciate my body in a bikini and still want to set fire to the patriarchy.”

“Let’s watch Captain America,” she cuts in with forced brightness, turning back to the television. “It’s fun, and everyone likes looking at Chris Evans. He’s America’s Ass for a reason, you know.”

“Even in my lowest moments, even in the nadirs of hurt and betrayal, I still believed in our love story, in our happiness as a family. James changed our present and our future, but not our past.”

“Once a woman is painted as a hysteric, the rest of the story is washed away.”

“We had all been taught to fill in the hole that men left, to be quiet about men behaving badly, to move on with grace.”

“Taylor Swift's album folklore was released on July 24, Susan's birthday. I had never been an avid fan, but it felt like the album was written especially for me. There were songs about illicit affairs, the end of a relationship (‘you never gave a warning sign’), heartbreak, mad women. It became the soundtrack of my summer. I abandoned books and podcasts. I pressed play, again and again.”

“You’re looking at me like I’m nuts, honey, and you’re right. I am. I am out of my mind when it comes to you,” I said, shrugging because it was a fact. “When I’m near you, the way I feel steals the breath from my body. It’s like I breathe for you, like I exist to exist alongside of you.”

“Remember—you don’t have to overanalyze the past. Just live your now life.”

“My love for you is fundamental to who I am. It’s deep in my bones. A sonnet written in the marrow.”

“Don’t tranquilize yourself. You’re not a house pet. Your fire is one of the things I admire most about you.”

“Your scene partner is your life. If this is to work, you must follow them wherever they go. You must follow them to the end, into death if necessary.”

“For that was the true cost of happiness: never knowing when it might be lost.”

‘A bad kisser? A bad kisser? I mean, “workaholic”? Fine. There’s no shame in being fantastic at your job. “Not fun”? Whatever. Fun was overrated. But a “bad kisser”? That was the kind of insult that would haunt me to my grave.’ 🤣

“The truth is, there’s no such thing as a normal life. There’s just the time you get and how you spend it.”

“I accepted how things are a long time ago,” said Noah placidly.
“Wow, okay,” said AJ. “So you’re happy with your steady diet of meaningless sex, is what you’re saying.”
Noah threw his head back. “No,” he erupted. “I’m saying that I’ve had years to adjust to the fact that I’m not capable of loving another person the way that I love you.”