“
When you find a guy who calls you beautiful instead of hot, who calls you back when you hang up on him, who will stand in front of you when other’s cast stones, or will stay awake just to watch you sleep, who wants to show you off to the world when you are in sweats, who will hold your hand when your sick, who thinks your pretty without makeup, the one who turns to his friends and say, ‘that’s her’, the one that would bear your rejection because losing you means losing his will to live, who kisses you when you screw up, watches the stars and names one for you and will hold and rock that baby for hours so you can sleep…..you marry him all over again.
”
”
Shannon L. Alder
“
Him that I love, I wish to be free -- even from me.
”
”
Anne Morrow Lindbergh
“
It was so nice just to live in the moment, to enjoy holding him so closely, to pretend for a little while that they were merely two young people in love and nothing else.
”
”
Melissa de la Cruz (The Van Alen Legacy (Blue Bloods, #4))
“
Being with him made me want to make my own dreams, discover my own path. I was my best self when I was with him.
”
”
Heather Anastasiu (Glitch (Glitch, #1))
“
At times he felt that he had almost rather not be in love with her, for it brought him no peace. What was the use of it, if it was only going to be painful?
”
”
Larry McMurtry (Lonesome Dove (Lonesome Dove, #1))
“
I'm falling in love. I am in love. and it's not with Xander, though I do love him. I'm sure of that, as sure as I am of the fact what I feel for Ky is something different.
”
”
Ally Condie (Matched (Matched, #1))
“
I was in love with Scott Bennett. That I had been in love with him my whole life, practically.
”
”
Meg Cabot (Teen Idol)
“
Voicemail #1: “Hi, Isabel Culpeper. I am lying in my bed, looking at the ceiling. I am mostly naked. I am thinking of … your mother. Call me.”
Voicemail #2: The first minute and thirty seconds of “I’ve Gotta Get a Message to You” by the Bee Gees.
Voicemail #3: “I’m bored. I need to be entertained. Sam is moping. I may kill him with his own guitar. It would give me something to do and also make him say something. Two birds with one stone! I find all these old expressions unnecessarily violent. Like, ring around the rosy. That’s about the plague, did you know? Of course you did. The plague is, like, your older cousin. Hey, does Sam talk to you? He says jack shit to me. God, I’m bored. Call me.”
Voicemail #4: “Hotel California” by the Eagles, in its entirety, with every instance of the word California replaced with Minnesota.
Voicemail #5: “Hi, this is Cole St. Clair. Want to know two true things? One, you’re never picking up this phone. Two, I’m never going to stop leaving long messages. It’s like therapy. Gotta talk to someone. Hey, you know what I figured out today? Victor’s dead. I figured it out yesterday, too. Every day I figure it out again. I don’t know what I’m doing here. I feel like there’s no one I can —”
Voicemail #6: “So, yeah, I’m sorry. That last message went a little pear-shaped. You like that expression? Sam said it the other day. Hey, try this theory on for size: I think he’s a dead British housewife reincarnated into a Beatle’s body. You know, I used to know this band that put on fake British accents for their shows. Boy, did they suck, aside from being assholes. I can’t remember their name now. I’m either getting senile or I’ve done enough to my brain that stuff’s falling out. Not so fair of me to make this one-sided, is it? I’m always talking about myself in these things. So, how are you, Isabel Rosemary Culpeper? Smile lately? Hot Toddies. That was the name of the band. The Hot Toddies.”
Voicemail #20: “I wish you’d answer.
”
”
Maggie Stiefvater (Forever (The Wolves of Mercy Falls, #3))
“
Though no one notices at the time, in-loveness obliterates the humanity of the beloved. One does a curious kind of insult to another by falling in love with him, for we are really looking at our own projection of God, not at the other person. If two people are in love, they tread on star dust for a time and live happily ever after—that is so long as this experience of divinity has obliterated time for them. Only when they come down to earth do they have to look at each other realistically and only then does the possibility of mature love exist. If one person is in love and the other not, the cooler one is likely to say, "We would have something better between us if you would look at me rather than at your image of me.
”
”
Robert A. Johnson (Owning Your Own Shadow: Understanding the Dark Side of the Psyche)
“
It's the smell of him in the bathroom, all I need to get ready for the day. Watching him get dressed, and the sound in the kitchen; a slow hum of a song and his movements, picking things to eat. The way I could observe him, for hours, just go on with his day – or as he sleeps – simply breathing in and out, in and out, and it's like the hymn that sings me to peace.
I know the world is still out there and I know I'm not yet friendly to its pace, but as long as I know him with me, here, there, somewhere – us – I know I have a chance.
”
”
Charlotte Eriksson
“
When he smiles at me, I feel like I'm sitting under a heat lamp. I live for the times when his fingers brush my leg at lunch, or when we pass in the hallways and he raises his eyebrows at me, like we have a secret. I should feel bad--and I do, most of the time--but how can I stop thinking about him when seeing his face makes me feel so alive?
”
”
Melissa C. Walker (Unbreak My Heart)
“
She gazed at him alluringly and grinned. No further words were necessary.
”
”
Jason Medina (A Ghost In New Orleans)
“
When the love-led man had ceased from his labours Bathsheba came and looked him in the face.
'Gabriel, will you you stay on with me?' she said, smiling winningly, and not troubling to bring her lips quite together again at the end, because there was going to be another smile soon.
'I will,' said Gabriel.
And she smiled on him again.
”
”
Thomas Hardy (Far From the Madding Crowd)
“
You didn't like him, did you, Dad?"
"It wasn't that I didn't like him," my dad says slowly. "It was just that he lives in a completely different world, and I worried that he didn't really approve of you the way you are, that he was trying to change you into something else."
God, I never realized my dad was that perceptive..
"You see, the thing is," he says after we've both sat for a while in the sunshine, "the thing is that love is really the most important thing. I know it's hard for you to see it now" - he chuckles quietly- "but when I first laid eyes on your mother I thought she was fantastic, and I've never stopped loving her, not for a second. Oh yes, we've had our rough patches, and she can be a bit of an old battle-ax at times, but I still love her. That in-love feeling at the beginning settles down into a different, familiar sort of love, but it has to be there right from the start, otherwise it just won't work.
”
”
Jane Green (Mr. Maybe)
“
Nothing belongs to itself anymore.
These trees are yours because you once looked at them.
These streets are yours because you once traversed them.
These coffee shops and bookshops, these cafés and bars, their sole owner is you.
They gave themselves so willingly, surrendering to your perfume.
You sang with the birds and they stopped to listen to you.
You smiled at the sheepish stars and they fell into your hair.
The sun and moon, the sea and mountain, they have all left from heartbreak.
Nothing belongs to itself anymore.
You once spoke to Him, and then God became yours.
He sits with us in darkness now
to plot how to make you ours.” K.K.
”
”
Kamand Kojouri
“
I looked at him through swollen eyes. The light glowed around him and he looked like he was floating. He was a glowing creature from another world, opening his gossamer wings and beckoning me. I wanted to tumble into his embrace. We'd be able to fly and I wouldn't mind the sunshine or the sky if he could just hold me forever.
”
”
Heather Anastasiu (Glitch (Glitch, #1))
“
Music is the secret language that effortlessly connects our bodies, our minds, and our souls. I’m addicted to the lyrics— they speak to me in a way only he and I will understand. So, until it’s safe to speak my mind, I’ll speak to him through lyrics. I’m addicted to him. He’s a song I never want to end.
”
”
Hope Alcocer (Where Hope Lies)
“
You are not really dying,” he said, the oddest tone to his voice, “are you?”Jem nodded. “So they tell me.”“I am sorry,” Will said.“No,” Jem said softly. He drew his jacket aside and took a knife from the belt at his waist.“Don’t be ordinary like that. Don’t say you’re sorry. Say you’ll train with me.”
He held out the knife to Will, hilt rst. Charlotte held her breath, afraid to move. She feltas if she were watching something very important happen, though she could not have saidwhat.Will reached out and took the knife, his eyes never leaving Jem’s face. His fingers brushedthe other boy’s as he took the weapon from him. It was the rst time, Charlotte thought,that she had ever seen him touch any other person willingly.“I’ll train with you,” he said.
Jem, Will’s parabatai, treated her with the distant sweet kindness reserved for the littlesisters of one’s friends, but he would always side with Will. Kindly, but rmly, he put Willabove everything else in the world.Well, nearly everything. She had been most struck by Jem when she rst came to theInstitute—he had an unearthly, unusual beauty, with his silvery hair and eyes and delicate features. He looked like a prince in a fairy-tale book, and she might have considered developing an attachment to him, were it not so absolutely clear that he was entirely inlove with Tessa Gray. His eyes followed her where she went, and his voice changed when hespoke to her. Cecily had once heard her mother say in amusement that one of theirneighbors’ boys looked at a girl as if she were “the only star in the sky” and that was theway Jem looked at Tessa.Cecily didn’t resent it: Tessa was pleasant and kind to her, if a little shy, and with herface always stuck in a book, like Will. If that was the sort of girl Jem wanted, she and henever would have suited—and the longer she remained at the Institute, the more sherealized how awkward it would have made things with Will. He was ferociously protectiveof Jem, and he would have watched her constantly in case she ever distressed or hurt him inany way. No—she was far better out of the whole thing.
”
”
Cassandra Clare (Clockwork Princess (The Infernal Devices, #3))
“
From morning until sunset — and sometimes by moonlight — the surfer dudes ride waves onto shore worried about nothing more than impressing the gorgeous girls watching them. Sometimes those bikini-clad California sweethearts let a boy get to second base to a romantic Leslie Gore or Connie Francis song. If she's really in-love, and trusts him not to tell his buddies, she'll let him round third and wave him home. When that happens, it usually isn't long before Nautica is all abuzz about an impending beach wedding.
”
”
Bobby Underwood (Nautica City)
“
She'd hurt him, but she'd attempted everything in her power to make things right. She'd shown him in a thousand ways that she was honorable and strong and generous and very human, maybe even more vividly human than anyone he'd ever known.
”
”
Leigh Bardugo (Six of Crows (Six of Crows, #1))
“
She had not answered my question. She had not told me that she loved his eyes or the sound of his voice. She had not said that his touch lit a fire on her skin. Then it came to me: she loved him because he did not seek to change her. If I had made him, or if my father had found him, it did not matter. My sister would have a husband who would not make her sit, veiled and weaving, in his tent. He would not take another wife, as my father had done. She would be his, and he would be hers, alone. This was why she loved him, and it made my heart glad to hear it.
”
”
E.K. Johnston (A Thousand Nights (A Thousand Nights, #1))
“
He is smitten on the brain, -he reads and writes verses! I caught him in the act! Fools might say he was inspired; but I know it is the first and worst symptom of lunacy. All other maniacs have lucid intervals; some are curable; but the madness of poets, dogs, and musicians, is past hope. Earth possesses no remedy, science no cure.
”
”
Edward John Trelawny (Adventures Of A Younger Son (1897))
“
Lightening struck leaving its effects to course through her veins fusing him into the essence of her life force.
”
”
Truth Devour (Wantin (Wantin #1))
“
Being in love was something you “just knew”, because your heart felt swollen and you never stopped thinking about him and you wondered how you were ever happy before.
”
”
Tiana Warner (Ice Massacre (Mermaids of Eriana Kwai, #1))
“
I watch him start to undress me. The ground moves my feet, but it’s my knees that are shaking. The temperature in the room goes up a few degrees. My breathing quickens.
I watch his fingers pick at my tank top. Nicholas slides one hand underneath. He runs his fingers over my torso, presses them against my stomach. They move up and down with each one of my breaths.
”
”
Charlotte Byrd (Tell Me to Stop (Tell Me #1))
“
I never knew the difference between loving someone and being in love,” he began. “I don’t know why, because now it seems so obvious. I mean, it’s in the name: in love. When you love someone that just means you care; but when you’re in love, that means you’re a part of it.” He scanned the audience and landed on Paxton and Jade holding hands in the third row. “The feeling consumes you,” he continued. “And when you’re surrounded by that want and that need to make that other person happy, you can’t see anything else. You’re blind to all of the hate and the hurt that’s waiting on the outside. None of it matters, because in here – in love – nothing hurts.” Larson watched as a drop of his own tears fell onto the surface in front of him. “I don’t care if I’m blind for the rest of my life. I loved Owen. I’m in love with him. And even though he’s gone, I’ll never leave this place we made.
”
”
Megan Duke (Small Circles)
“
To fall in love is to project the most noble and infinitely valuable part of one’s being onto another human being (..) the divinity we see in others is truly there, but we don’t have the right to see it until we have taken away our own projections. (..) in-loveness obliterates the humanity of the beloved. One does a curious kind of insult to another by falling in love with him, for we are really looking at our own projection of God, not at the other person.
”
”
Robert A. Johnson (Owning Your Own Shadow: Understanding the Dark Side of the Psyche)
“
For the rest of the day Hubert couldn't stop grinning. He grinned in the lift on the way back down to the warehouse. He grinned as he passed Mr Coulthard yelling at the new lads. And he grinned all the more later when Kenneth told him a very odd story about being sent on a wild-goose chase to the fourth floor by a girl from Haberdashery.
”
”
Mike Gayle (All the Lonely People)
“
I loved Rider.
Oh, God.
I was in love with him.
I knew that much was true. Love was the swelling, hopeful feeling in my chest every time I saw him. Love was the way I could forget about everything when I was with him. Love was the catch in my breath when he looked at me in his intense way. Love was the gasp he could draw out of me with the simplest of touches. Love was the way I could...I could be myself around him, know that I didn’t need to be perfect or worry about what he was thinking, because he accepted me.
”
”
Jennifer L. Armentrout (The Problem with Forever)
“
I cared about Ben, but I was never in love with him. I was in love with what it said about me that I had a boyfriend like Ben, and that's just different.
”
”
Nadia Bolz-Weber (Pastrix: The Cranky, Beautiful Faith of a Sinner & Saint)
“
As if he had simply stolen a piece of her heart and without him it refused to beat.
”
”
S.M. Yair-Levy (Stolen (The Collectors #1))
“
It's a physical sickness. Étienne. How much I love him.
I love Étienne.
I love it when he cocks an eyebrow whenever I say something he finds clever or amusing. I love listening to his boots clomp across my bedroom ceiling. I love that the accent over his first name is called an acute accent, and that he has a cute accent.
I love that.
I love sitting beside him in physics. Brushing against him during labs. His messy handwriting on our worksheets. I love handing him his backpack when class is over, because then my fingers smell like him for the next ten minutes. And when Amanda says something lame, and he seeks me out to exchange an eye roll — I love that, too. I love his boyish laugh and his wrinkled shirts and his ridiculous knitted hat. I love his large brown eyes, and the way he bites his nails, and I love his hair so much I could die.
There's only one thing I don't love about him. Her.
”
”
Stephanie Perkins (Anna and the French Kiss (Anna and the French Kiss, #1))
“
You’re right.” A wicked little grin tugged at his lips. “I think we should celebrate.” Pausing, he waggled his brows at me. “We have fifty minutes now. I only need, like, five of them.”
“Oh my God,” I laughed, shoving at his shoulders. “You’re terrible.”
“I’m not terrible.” His eyes met mine, and the flutter was back, deeper and more dizzying. “I’m in love.”
Oh, gosh. My heart swelled like a balloon, and all I could do was stare at him for several seconds before I managed to whisper, “I love you, too.”
“I know.” Rider lowered his mouth to mine, and the kiss scattered my thoughts.
”
”
Jennifer L. Armentrout (The Problem with Forever)
“
And there was Livia, standing in a little puddle of water. She smiled at him, though her hazel-green eyes were wary beneath the brim of a sodden hat. Right at that moment, staring at her across the entrance hall, Gideon Shaw, cynic, hedonist, drunkard, libertine, fell hopelessly in love. He had never been so completely in the thrall of another human being. So enchanted, and foolishly hopeful. A thousand endearments crowded his mind, and he realized ruefully that he was every bit the mooncalf that he had accused McKenna of being the previous day.
"Livia," he said softly, approaching her. His gaze raked over her flushed, rain-spattered face, while he thought that she looked like a bedraggled angel.
”
”
Lisa Kleypas (Again the Magic (Wallflowers, #0))
“
If I were really in love, I don’t think I could have said that. I probably would have tried to toy with his feelings a bit more, or maybe I would have had trouble finding the words. But all I felt then was a desire to help. And while I didn’t yet know the reason, it frightened me much more to think of him getting hurt than it did to think of someone else getting hurt.
”
”
Banana Yoshimoto (The Lake)
“
There are all kinds of ways to make love. If it's good, that's what you need. But going back to your Gary. You cling to him because he made you feel grounded. Everything around you was so different and you didn't know how to handle it. I think you do love him, Gabrielle, but I don't think you're in love with him. If you were in love with him, you wouldn't feel as if all your loyalty should belong to Aleksei.
”
”
Christine Feehan (Dark Promises (Dark, #25))
“
I fell in love with the way he knew my words before I even spoke…the way he touched me with his deep-set eyes…the way he could see into my soul…the way he moved me like I was the earth under his feet, sky above…the eternal poem…the way his heartbeat
synchronized with mine. The way he kissed me like I was the only way he could breathe…the way he
embraced me like pure love. The way he possessed me
like Poe
possessed
Annabel Lee
and she him.
”
”
Melody Lee (Moon Gypsy)
“
We won! We won!" Daisy jumped up and down and threw her arms around Liam, nearly knocking him over as she pressed her lips to his in a delighted kiss.
Her lips were soft and warm and sweet with chocolate. The shock of them short-circuited his brain and for a moment he couldn't breathe. And then he was pressing her lips apart, hungry for her, desperate for more.
She softened against him, sighed. He braced himself for her to retreat, but instead, she tightened her arms around him and kissed him back, her tongue tangling with his as she explored his mouth.
"Pizza!"
She pulled away, leaving him floundering, his brain struggling to understand why someone was shoving a box in his face when all he wanted was her sweet lips and her soft body and her sigh of surrender.
"Pizza selfie." Daisy held up her phone and took a picture of them with the pizza box angled in the corner. She laughed when she showed him the screen. This time he was the one who looked dazed.
”
”
Sara Desai (The Dating Plan (Marriage Game, #2))
“
Helen pictured him as a gangly boy, hurrying through his morning chores with a cache of forbidden marbles in his pocket. A bloom of emotion expanded in her chest, an electrifying happiness that almost bordered on pain.
She loved him. She loved the boy he had been, and the man he was now. She loved the look and smell and feel of him, the brusque charm of his accent, the touchy pride and determined will that had taken him so far in life, and the thousand other qualities that made him so extraordinary.
”
”
Lisa Kleypas (Marrying Winterborne (The Ravenels, #2))
“
We're going to give them one hell of a good time."
"This isn't my idea of a good time." Meeting Layla's crazy family, eating masala dosas, and going public with his feelings for the woman who had accepted him despite his failings was his idea of a good time. Holding her in his arms while the warm afternoon sunshine slid lazy fingers through the cracks in his curtains was his idea of a good time. Looking up from his desk to see her chewing on the end of her pencil, deep in thought, while a pile of donuts lay untouched beside her, was his idea of a good time.
”
”
Sara Desai (The Marriage Game (Marriage Game, #1))
“
Bianca?”
Startled, I focused on Toby again. “Hmm?”
“Are you all right?” he asked.
My fingers had been toying with the little B charm around my neck without my realizing it. Immediately I dropped my hand to my side. “I’m fine.”
“Casey warned me that you’re probably lying when you say that,” he said.
I gritted my teeth and searched the dance floor for my so-called friend. She was being added to my hit list.
“And I think she’s right,” Toby sighed.
“What?”
“Bianca, I can see what’s going on.” He glanced over his shoulder at Wesley before turning back to me with a little nod. “He’s been staring at you since he got here.”
“Has he?”
“I can see him in the mirrors over there. And you’ve been staring back,” Toby said. “It’s not just tonight either. I’ve seen the way he looks at you during school. In the hallways. He likes you, doesn’t he?”
“I… I don’t know. I guess.” Oh God, this was uncomfortable. I just kept spinning my straw between my fingers and watching the little waves that appeared on the surface of my drink. I couldn’t meet Toby’s gaze.
“I don’t have to guess,” he said. “It’s pretty obvious. And the way you look at him makes me think you’re in love with him, too.”
“No!” I cried, releasing my straw and glaring up at Toby. “No, no, no. I am not in love with him, okay?”
Toby gave me a small smile and said, “But you do have feelings for him.”
I couldn’t see any sign of pain in his eyes, just a touch of amusement. That made it a lot easier to give him an answer. “Um,… yeah.”
“Then go to him.”
I rolled my eyes without meaning to. It was just so automatic. “Jesus, Toby,” I said, “that sounds like a line out of a bad movie.”
Toby shrugged. “Maybe, but I’m serious, Bianca. If you feel that way about him, you should go over there.
”
”
Kody Keplinger (The DUFF: Designated Ugly Fat Friend (Hamilton High, #1))
“
Something suddenly, as if under a last determinant touch, welled up in him and overflowed—the sense of his good fortune and her variety, of the future she promised, the interest she supplied. "All women but you are stupid. How can I look at another? You're different and different—and then you're different again . . . Even 'society' won't know how good for it you are; it's too stupid, and you're beyond it. You'd have to pull it uphill—it's you yourself who are at the top. The women one meets—what are they but books one has already read? You're a whole library of the unknown, the uncut." He almost moaned, he ached, from the depth of his content. "Upon my word, I've a subscription!
”
”
Henry James (The Wings of the Dove)
“
There’s more, Anna. When we first got to California,” she says, “you asked me if I remembered your birthday party.” I nod, picking at a thread on her comforter. “I did remember. Matt was acting like such a space cadet that night after we got home – like he was floating. I can’t believe I didn’t figure it out, but of all the things that he could have been thinking about, you were the last – I mean, my mind just didn’t even go there. You were like our sister.”
“But I–”
“Wait – let me get this out.” She looks at me hard, her broken wing eyebrow trembling to keep the tears back. “After I brushed my teeth, I walked into his room. He was sitting on his bed, playing with that blue glass necklace he always wore, a big smile on his face. Remember the necklace?”
The necklace.
“Of course.”
“I asked him what was so funny. He jumped a little, not knowing I’d been watching him smile there like a goofy little kid. He said it was nothing – just that he had fun at the party. And I believed him, all the way up until the day I read your journal. That’s when it all made sense. All the times he’d ask me about who you liked at school, or who wanted to take you to whatever dance.”
She’s quiet as I digest her story, putting the pieces together to form a complete whole from the missing half that’s haunted me since that night – how did he really feel about me? Was it just one stupid moment, perpetuated a little too long, only to be forgotten as quickly as it came? As soon as he went away to school?
“I was in love with him forever – since I was, like, ten,” I confess.
“Yeah,” she says. “You both were in love. I know that now. We were all so close, you know? I just didn’t see it coming until I read your – I’m sorry, Anna.”
I close my eyes, fighting back the image of her hand on my journal. “It’s okay.
”
”
Sarah Ockler (Twenty Boy Summer)
“
The phone went off. Private caller.
“Thank fuck,” he said as he accepted it. “Payne—”
“No.”
Manny closed his eyes: Her brother sounded like hell.
“Where is she.”
“We don’t know. And there’s nothing that we can do from here—we’re trapped inside.”
The guy exhaled like he was smoking something.
“What the fuck happened before she left? I thought she’d be spending all night with you. It’s cool if you two . . . you know . . . but why did she leave so early?”
“I told her it wasn’t going to work out.”
Long silence. “What the fuck are you thinking?”
Clearly if it hadn’t been all bright and sunny outside, motherfucker would have been knocking on Manny’s door, looking to kick some Italian ass.
“I thought that would make you happy.”
“Oh, yeah. Abso—break my sister’s fucking heart. I’m all for that.”
Another sharp exhale, like he was blowing smoke.
“She’s in love with you, asshole.”
Didn’t that stop him in his tracks. But he got back with the program.
“Listen, she and I . . .”
At that point, he was supposed to explain the stuff about the results of his physical and how he was all freaked out and didn’t know what the repercussions were. But the trouble was, in the hours since Payne had taken off, he’d come to realize that however true that shit was, there was a more fundamental thing going on at the core of him:
He was being a little bitch.
What the go-away had really been about was the fact that he was shitting in his pants because he’d actually fallen in love with a woman . . . female . . . whatever.
Yeah, there was a tremendous overlay of metaphysical stuff he didn’t understand and couldn’t explain, blah, blah, blah. But at the center of it all, he felt so much for Payne that he didn’t know himself anymore, and that was the terrifying part.
He’d pussied out when he’d had the chance. But that was done now.
“She and I are in love,” he said clearly.
And damn him to hell, he should have had the balls to tell her. And hold her. And keep her.
“So like I said, what the fuck are you thinking.”
“Excellent question.”
-Manny & Vishous
”
”
J.R. Ward (Lover Unleashed (Black Dagger Brotherhood, #9))
“
What is there to forgive? You didn't take the child from us. The gods fell in-love with him and wanted him back, that's all. He's in heaven now and wishes us only happiness.
”
”
Kail Mursili
“
She had no desire to see Conall dead. She loved him.
That was a thought that caught her by surprise. Claray had liked Conall from the start, admired his sense of honor and determination to look after his people. She also appreciated all he had done for her, rescuing her from Kerr, carrying her before him on his mount while she slept, no matter that he was exhausted. He'd also been most patient with her rescuing animals at every turn on the way home to MacFarlane when she'd known he hadn't wanted her to. He was a good man----he worked day and night here to build a home for them all, and he'd tended to her when she was injured and ill with such gentleness and kindness. And then there was his loving.
Aye, at first Claray had worried that her soul might be in peril because of the pleasure he gave her, but she'd come to terms with that. It was just too beautiful and intimate to be something God would begrudge them. Surely, if He hadn't wanted them to enjoy each other like that, He wouldn't have made it possible for people to enjoy it as they did. At least that was her reasoning. Perhaps it was just a justification to allow her to continue to enjoy her marital bed without guilt, but since she found it impossible not to, she was happy to accept that justification.
Whatever the case, with all that she admired, respected and enjoyed about her husband, Claray supposed it would be surprising if she did not love him. Conall was a man worth loving, and she simply could not bear the thought of this man ending his life.
”
”
Lynsay Sands (Highland Wolf (Highland Brides, #10))
“
I've never seen a battle like this. Never."
He gaped at Carah, his hand over his heart as he stared, open-mouthed, in complete adoration of the maiden warrior. "She. Is. So...." He didn't seem able to finish his thought.
Carah turned and gave him a crooked, knowing smile. "What did you think of that, young warrior?"
'That..." Jerin stammered, "That was sooo completely amazing."
She winked. "You bet'cha it was.
”
”
Jackie Castle (Illuminated (White Road Chronicles, #1))
“
I'm inlove with him. Completely. Absolutely. Tragically.
”
”
Katie Kacvinsky (Finally, Forever (First Comes Love, #3))
“
Never before had he told a woman he loved her, meaning it the way he did now. In the past they were only convenient words—a means to satisfy what he thought to be some sort of basic female need. Not this time. This time those words satisfied a need within him,
”
”
Bonita Clifton
“
Is that the only reason you’re helping me?”
“Isn’t it enough?”
“It is. I’m just wondering if there’s something else.”
“No,” he harrumphed. “Wait, yes. Now I remember—I also want to fuck you again.”
I tripped over my own feet, about to dive into the ground. He caught me by the hem of my shirt, jerking me upright.
I’ll always catch you. When have I ever let you take the hit for something, Dot?
“You did not just say that.” I slapped branches out of my way as I regained my balance.
“Did too. Fair warning—I want much more than fucking this time around. I want dates. I want laughs. I want you to be honest with me. All the stuff that freaks you out for some reason. No strings attached. No commitment. Just fun. A perfect do-over.”
“Why do you need a do-over?”
“So my last memory of us won’t be you almost vomiting because we had sex.”
“I almost vomited because your sister caught us!” I shrieked. “Which is exactly why this won’t happen again. You’re high if you think I’m betraying her trust a second time around.”
“Thought you’d say that. I have great news for you.”
“What?”
“She no longer gives a fuck.”
“That’s not tru—”
“It is. Ask her yourself.”
The confidence with which he’d said that made my heart twist like Play-Doh. What had changed between then and now? Why was she okay with us hooking up all of a sudden?
“Why wouldn’t she care?” I asked in a panic.
“Because it no longer matters.”
“How c—”
“Come on, Bitchy. Put two and two together.”
Bitchy.
He’d called me Bitchy.
The rain intensified, knocking on our faces. I skidded to an abrupt stop. A wave of memories crashed into me all at once, nearly knocking me down on my ass. Everything became crystal clear in one swift moment.
Row defending me when Dylan caught us having sex.
Row teaching me how to slow dance in his room before my very first prom because I knew I would be too terrified to ever dance with anyone else and didn’t want to miss out.
Row and I sitting on the hood of his car, in front of an endless ocean, the moon, and the stars. Me saying, “Isn’t it beautiful?” and him answering, “Yes, you are.”
Row being essentially in love with me.
I couldn’t even touch the other revelation right now. It was too much to process.
Bitchy. Bitchy. Bitchy.
McMonster. Selfless, sweet McMonster. Who seemed to know me inside out. Who could read me like an open book. Could it be?
But it couldn’t be.
No. It couldn't.
Not him.
not the shinest boy in Staindrop.
"No more running." I planted my feet on the pavement, clutching my knees, panting. Tears prickled the back of my eyeballs. Row looked on high alert. Neither of us seemed ready to acknowledge the fact that he was McMonster and I was Bitchy.
For the first time since I'd known him, he looked like a boy. Not a heartthrob, not a world-famous chef, not a formidable boss-- just a boy.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Truly Madly Deeply (Forbidden Love, #1))
“
... and we'd probably would be a good team, if he could stay out of love with me, or if I could get in love with him. Neither seemed likely.
”
”
Larry McMurtry (Somebody's Darling)
“
Hold on,” Amber says, holding up a finger while she pulls off her shoe. “I’m not finished.” She takes her shoe in her hand and glowers at Theodore, then rears back and throws it across the sidewalk, hitting him square between the legs. “I hate your stupid pants, asshole!” she yells. “Fallon deserves better than you, and SO DOES NANTUCKET!
”
”
Colleen Hoover (November 9)
“
In all the days that followed, I sometimes felt like I was dreaming.
All my life, I had known I would marry the Gentle Lord, and all my life, I had expected it to be a horror and a doom. I had never thought that I would know love at all, much less in his arms. Now that every hour was a delight, I couldn't quite believe it was real.
We still looked for an answer. We still hunted through the library and prowled the corridors. But it seemed less like a quest and more like a game. And we played in that house. We chased each other through the rose garden, hiding and seeking in turns; we built castles in a room full of sand; I made him sit in the kitchen while I tried to cook for him and set the pans on fire.
And I was his delight and he was mine. I had read love poems when studying the ancient tongues, though I had never sought them out like Astraia; I had learnt the rhythm of the words and phrases, but I had always thought them empty decorations. They said that love was terrifying and tender, wild and sweet, and none of it made any sense.
But now I knew that every mad word was true. For Ignifex was still himself, still mocking and wild and inhuman, terrible as a legion arrayed for war; but in my arms he became gentle, and his kisses were sweeter than wine.
”
”
Rosamund Hodge (Cruel Beauty)
“
Back in Atlantica, Ariel couldn't contain the whirlwind of emotions that coursed through her. She had saved a human! The most beautiful and kind and wonderful human she had ever seen. And she'd spoken to him.
"Eric," she whispered, her stomach fluttering like butterfly fish. "When am I going to see you again?"
She plucked a flower from one of the reef beds and rolled onto her back as she giggled to herself.
”
”
Elizabeth Lim (A Twisted Tale Anthology)
“
I'm waiting for someone like Tanya who keeps the ball and chain tight without letting it chafe."
Zee let out the deepest sigh any human should be allowed to sigh. Seriously, if all those rabid female fans saw him moon over Tanya, there would be a serious threat to the poor woman's life.
”
”
Sonali Dev (Recipe for Persuasion (The Rajes, #2))
“
To fall in love is to project the most noble part of one’s being onto another human being (..) the divinity we see in others is truly there, but we don’t have the right to see it until we have taken away our own projections. (..) in-loveness obliterates the humanity of the beloved. One does a curious kind of insult to another by falling in love with him, for we are really looking at our own projection of God, not at the other person.
”
”
Robert A. Johnson (Owning Your Own Shadow: Understanding the Dark Side of the Psyche)
“
He desperately wanted to hear Lily say merci again, but Naneh Goli folded a piece of naan around a boiled egg, placed it in his knapsack, and pushed him out the door with a long list of instructions he didn't hear. All he could think was, I fell in love at eight fifteen on the morning of June 9.
Later that afternoon he scurried around the kitchen, underfoot until Naneh Goli sent him to the storeroom for jam. The cellar, illuminated by a bulb on a string, was like a pharmacy, with shelves of rosewater, orange blossom water, quince syrup, lime syrup, vinegars, and jars of pickled vegetables, all painstakingly labeled in Agha (Mr.) Zod's shaky script. Karim paused to read the labels but found nothing to ease the knocking in his chest, so he took the last jar of fig preserves for Lily. His Lily jan (dear), Lily rose, Lily shirin (sweet), Lily morning, Lily moon, Lily merci.
”
”
Donia Bijan (The Last Days of Café Leila)
“
I’m going to have to talk to HR sooner rather than later about arranging for my maternity leave anyway. And people are going to find out in time. I unlock my phone and open Instagram. I have an oddly high number of followers thanks to an article Forbes did on me right after I sold the app to Apple. I’m not that interesting of a person, but I do find the best funny memes to share.
I upload my favorite picture of Archer and me from this weekend, heart fluttering when I look at it. We’re standing by the pink balloons, and looking lovingly into each other’s eyes. My hair is tucked awkwardly behind my ear, but we both look so happy.
So inlove.
Archer’s hand is on my stomach, and his smile is genuine. Man, I miss him. Tomorrow is too far away. Long distance sucks.
“We cannot wait for spring. Hashtag thirteen weeks. Hashtag baby girl,” I say out loud as Itype.
“Don’t forget hashtag blessed.”
“And grateful. Please. I might be basic, but I know enough not to flaunt it around on social media,” I laugh and post the photo. But I really do feel those things.
”
”
Emily Goodwin (End Game (Dawson Family, #2))
“
I asked him why he’s so scared to commit and he said he’s not scared to commit, he’s just not in the mood to commit to me because he’s committed to himself, and I knew in that instant I wanted him more than I’ve ever wanted anything. I wanted to be with him, but I also wanted to be him, replace myself with him and find a girl like me who look at me like I looked at him when he said that.
”
”
Charlotte Eriksson (He loved me some days. I'm sure he did: 99 essays on growth through loss)
“
I don’t think I ever told you about the night I fell down the ladder by the fire escape,
because I was drunk and sad after a fight with my mum, or my ex-boyfriend, I can’t remember,
but I fell down the ladder because I was drunk and sad and I injured my knee a little and when my ex-boyfriend asked about it I thought about using it against him, like blaming him for making me climb up the ladder so he would feel guilty and then love me a little more.
But that’s not how love works. I know that now but I didn’t back then.
”
”
Charlotte Eriksson (He loved me some days. I'm sure he did: 99 essays on growth through loss)
“
His mother's flowers won all sorts of prizes for their beauty, but he thought Libby, with her brilliant copper-streaked hair and striking blue eyes, was more beautiful than anything found in a garden. She was an enchanting princess, reigning over a comely court.
He'd known Libby was a princess since they were children. She'd captivated him long before he started school, and for years, he'd been trying to win her attention. Some people thought she was crazy, but she wasn't. She was ethereal. Magical. Like a fairy or butterfly.
If only he could be like her. Happy and free.
She seemed to understand what so many people did not. That happiness was not found in trying to pigeonhole one's self into another's ideal. Happiness was found in embracing all you were created to be.
She twirled again in the twilight.
Libby seemed to draw energy from the flowers.
”
”
Melanie Dobson (Shadows of Ladenbrooke Manor)
“
From what you have seen so far it should be obvious that a major source of toxic shame is the family system and its multigenerational patterns of unresolved secrets.
More specifically these families are created by the shame-based people who find and marry each other. Each looks to and expects the other to take care of and parent the child within him or her. Each is incomplete and insatiable. The insatiability is rooted in each person's unmet childhood needs. When two adult children meet and fall in love, the child in each looks to the other to fill his or her needs. Since "in love" is a natural state of fusion, the incomplete children fuse together as they had done in the symbiotic stage of infancy. Each feels a sense of oneness and completeness. Since “in-love” is always erotic, each feels "oceanic" in the sexual embrace. “Oceanic” love is without boundaries. Being in love is as powerful as any narcotic. One feels whole and ecstatic.
Unfortunately this state cannot last. The ecstatic consciousness is highly selective. Lovers focus on sameness and are intrigued by the newness of each other. Soon, however, real differences in socialization begin to emerge. The two families of origin rear their shame-based heads. Now the battle begins! Who will take care of whom? Whose family rules will win out? The more shame-based each person is, the more each other's differences will be intolerable. “If you loved me, you'd do it my way,” each cajoles the other. The Hatfields and the Mccoys go at it again.
”
”
John Bradshaw (Healing the Shame that Binds You)
“
Only now he was on his way to finally meet her and this time to remain with her till death tore them apart. Firangia’s feet were unmoored from the land, he walked in the air and flew towards the moon. A lady roamed there and with open arms waited to welcome him.
”
”
Mukta Singh-Zocchi (The Thugs & a Courtesan)