A Spindle Splintered Quotes

Maybe the universe doesn’t naturally bend toward justice either; maybe it’s only the weight of hands and hearts pulling it true, inch by stubborn inch.

I see her choosing now whether to make her love into a cage or a key.

I should have spent more time thinking about your life than worrying about your death.

I never stopped trying to save you, so don't you fucking dare stop trying to save yourself.

Their love has hung above me like the sun, a burning brightness I could survive only if I never looked straight at it, never flew too close.

Hey, it's okay, alright? I'll walk with you, every step. You won't be alone." We might not be able to fix our bullshit stories, but surely we can be less lonely inside them, here at the end. "Just go to sleep. I'm right here.

let’s not pretend girls with swords don’t get shit done.

In that moment he reminds me of Charm’s parents, or maybe my own: a person whose love is a burdensome thing, a weight dragging always at your ankles.

If you like something, like it hard, because you don't have a lot of time to waste

I'm turning away when Prince Harold says, his voice thick and fleshy through his swollen nose, "I don't understand." His eyes are on Primrose and Charm, on the place where their hands are joined together so tightly they look like a single creature. "Well, Harold," I say gently. "They're lesbians.

Sleeping Beauty is the worst fairy tale, pretty much any way you slice it. It’s aimless and amoral and chauvinist as shit. It’s the fairy tale that feminist scholars cite when they want to talk about women’s passivity in historical narratives. (“She literally sleeps through her own climax,” as my favorite gender studies professor used to say. “Double entendre fully intended.”)... ..Even among the other nerds who majored in folklore, Sleeping Beauty is nobody’s favorite. The romantic girls like Beauty and the Beast; basic girls like Cinderella; goth girls like Snow White. Only the dying girls like Sleeping Beauty.

I riffle through my mental box of inspirational quotes and come up with a Dylan Thomas line that I actually know from Interstellar. “Do not go gentle into that good night, princess.

Even among the other nerds who majored in folklore, Sleeping Beauty is nobody's favorite. Romantic girls like Beauty and the Beast; vanilla girls like Cinderella; goth girls like Snow White. Only dying girls like Sleeping Beauty.

All of them stepped out of their own narratives to save someone else

I hope you find your happily ever after, or whatever." "Already did. I'm just looking for a better once upon a time.

I'm at least three-fourths straight, but her lashes are very long, and very golden, and I'm not made of stone.

You know it wasn't originally a spinning wheel in the story?' I offer, because alcohol transforms me into a chatty Wikipedia.

It's one of the rules for dying girls: if you like something, like it hard, because you don't have a lot of time to waste.

I can't remember if they did the "speak now or forever hold your peace" thing in Medieval times, or if it's one of those Victorian inventions, like brides wearing white or homophobia.

This time, when I press my finger to the end of a splintered spindle, I’m smiling.

And it was like—I don't know. A beacon being lit, a flint being struck in my chest. [...] It was my own shitty story made mythic and grand and beautiful. A princess cursed at birth. A sleep that never ends. A dying girl who refused to.

Sick kids learn to calibrate their expectations early, to negotiate with their shitty luck again and again.

I make myself keep listening to Zellandine, unflinching. I always hate it when people flinch from me, as if my wounds are weapons.

When I was eleven, I used my Make-a-Wish Foundation wish to spend a night in the Disney castle and get the full princess experience. It was a total letdown. I think I waited too long: eleven is old enough to see the cracks in the plaster, to sense the pity behind the megawatt smiles of the staff. It was like trying to play with my Barbies a year after I'd outgrown them, perfectly remembering how it used to feel but unable to feel it again.

A traveling magician sold it to me when I was sixteen. He swore to me that a single cut was enough to end a life." She says it flatly, matter-of-factly, but her eyes have gone hollow and her face is waxy again and suddenly I don't feel jokey at all. Suddenly I wonder why a princess would sleep with a poison blade beneath her bed, why she would purchase it in the first place. I picture myself at sixteen, a scarecrow of a girl stuffed with hormones and hunger instead of straw, so sick of dying I would do anything to live. I ran very different calculations in those days, comparing the Greyhound bus schedule to the number of hours before my parents would report me missing, multiplying hoarded pills by the number of days I would have on the run. I figured I could make it to Chicago before the cops were even looking for me, and from there I could go—anywhere. Do anything.

Behind her, in her absence, the house was grinding along, its cogs turning and teeth linking, belts creaking, and there must come a moment—any moment now—when a cog would bite on nothing, and spin on air: some necessary act would go unperformed, some service would not be provided; the whole mechanism would crunch and splinter and shriek out in protest, and come to a juddering halt, because she was not there. And all the time she was pulling further and further away, like a spindle twisting out upon a thread of flax. Pull far enough, twist and stretch it too thin, and the thread would snap.

Well, Harold,” I say gently. “They’re lesbians.

I hope you find your happily ever after, or whatever.” “Already did,” I say, and it’s possible that my voice is a little gluey, too. “I’m just looking for a better once upon a time.

SLEEPING BEAUTY IS pretty much the worst fairy tale, any way you slice it. It’s aimless and amoral and chauvinist as shit. It’s the fairy tale that feminist scholars cite when they want to talk about women’s passivity in historical narratives.

She looked beautiful. She looked dead. Later I’d find out that’s how every Sleeping Beauty looks—hot and blond and dead, lying in a bed that might be a bier.

Only dying girls like Sleeping Beauty.

Nice to know you’re trying to save yourself. Finally.” “Yeah, so maybe you can stop trying to save me. Finally.

This is a stone-cold lie, but I don’t call her on it. Some lies are important.

I’ve never thought about the future. I never had one.

Bruises fade, after all.

I don’t know if I believe in love at first sight in the real world, but we’re not in the real world, are we?

I’ve always resented people for trying to save me, but maybe this is how it works, maybe we save one another.

Even among the other nerds who majored in folklore, Sleeping Beauty is nobody’s favorite. Romantic girls like Beauty and the Beast; vanilla girls like Cinderella; goth girls like Snow White. Only dying girls like Sleeping Beauty.

suddenly I saw her as my mere reflection: a girl with a shitty story. A girl whose choices were stolen from her.

It’s a lie but I let it stand because she did the same for me, and sometimes lies are lifeboats.

Ariel might have given up her voice for a dude, but Aurora barely uses hers:

it seems that some dying girls follow different rules and dedicate themselves to saving others, rather than themselves.

Strangers tend to imagine that sick people are looking for ways to die with dignity, but mostly we’re looking for ways to live.

Close your eyes and go to sleep and let the world go on without you?

Primrose is watching me as if I'm a grisly car accident or a public marriage proposal: gruesome but mesmerizing.

Dad is the established crier of the family. He was asked to 'get a grip or leave the theater' during the last twenty minutes of Coco.

It was like a spark falling into my mind, catching me on fire. I asked for your help because it was the first time I thought anyone could help me.

sometimes lies are lifeboats.

Do not go gentle into that good night, princess. I beg of you.

(I know they promoted a reductive vision of women’s agency that privileged traditionally male-coded forms of power, but let’s not pretend girls with swords don’t get shit done.)

But suddenly I saw her as my mere reflection: a girl with a shitty story. A girl whose choices were stolen from her.