The Pact Jodi Picoult Quotes

I, um, I have this problem. I broke up with my boyfriend, you see. And I'm pretty upset about it, so I wanted to talk to my best friend. [...] The thing is, they're both you.

I love you," he whispered, and that was the moment he knew what he was going to do. When you loved someone, you put their needs before your own. No matter how inconceivable those needs were; no matter how fucked up; no matter how much it made you feel like you were ripping yourself into pieces.

You know, the mind is a remarkable thing. Just because you can't see the wound doesn't mean it isn't hurting. It scars all the time, but it heals.

Do you know what it's like to love someone so much, that you can't see yourself without picturing her? Or what it's like to touch someone, and feel like you've come home? What we had wasn't about sex, or about being with someone just to show off what you've got, the way it was for other kids our age. We were, well, meant to be together. Some people spend their whole lives looking for that one person. I was lucky enough to have her all along.

She was all the things I wasn't. And i was all the things she wasn't. she could paint circles around anyone; I couldn't even draw a straight line. She was never into sports; I've always been. Her hand, it fit mine.

No matter who you are, there is always some part of you that wishes you were someone else, and when, for a millisecond, you get that wish, it's a miracle.

How could he convey to someone who'd never even met her the way she always smelled like rain, or how his stomach knotted up every time he saw her shake loose her hair from its braid? How could he describe how it felt when she finished his sentences, turnec the mug they were sharing so that her mouth landed where his had been? How did he explain the way they could be in a locker room, or underwater, or in the piney woods of Maine, bus as long as Em was with him, he was at home?

The mind is a remarcable thing. Just because you can’t see the wound doesn’t mean it isn’t hurting

My whole life was about her, what if her whole life wasn’t all about me?

That's what love is, when your hindsight is 20/20, and you still wouldn't change a thing.

There is no one truth. There’s only what happened, based on how you perceive it.

I'm too much of a coward to kill myself. And too much of a coward to live

If you live in each other's pockets long enough, you're related.

He began to trace a pattern on the table with the nail of his thumb. "She kept saying she wanted to keep things exactly the way they were, and that she wished she could stop everything from changing. She got really nervous, like, talking about the future. She once told me that she could see herself now, and she could also see the kind of life she wanted to have - kids, husband, suburbs, you know - but she couldn't figure out how to get from point A to point B.

And, after all, what is a lie? 'Tis but the truth in masquerade.

Any highway . . . they all take you to the same place, don't they?

Accidents did not just happen. From time to time they were carefully plotted, calculated, and arranged to one’s advantage-all, of course, under the cloak of happenstance.

You always knew after shitty things happened, who your friends really were.

Adults, light-years away from this, rolled their eyes and smirked and said, "this too shall pass" - as if adolescence was a disease like chicken pox, something everyone recalled as a mild nuisance, completely forgetting how painful it had been at the time.

And he made love to her, offering his body in both tenderness and anger, unsure which was the best way to pass her bits of his soul so that she could patch her own with it

She had never been a pretty crier. She sobbed the way she did everything else - with passion and excess.

She had loved him. He knew this; he had never doubted it. But she had also asked him to kill her. If you love someone that much, you did not lay that sort of burden on him for the rest of his life.

What could it be like to find out, in a matter of minutes, that the person you believed the sun rose and set on was not the person you'd thought?

No," he said calmly, filled with purpose. he took her arms lightly in his hands and shook her. "I am not giving you up." Emily looked at him, and for just a moment he could read her thoughts. Melanie use to say they were like twins, with their own secret, silent language. in that instant, Chris felt her fear and her resignation, and the knotty pain of coming up against a brick wall again and again. She glanced away, and he could breathe again. "The thing is, Chris" Emily said, "it's not your choice.

I can see myself now, she said. And I can see what I want to be, ten years from now. But I don't understand how I'm going to get from here to there.

I can't do this to you,' he said, drawing back. Emily put her hand on his and pulled the gun to her temple. 'Then do it for me,' she said.

Just 'cause you can't see me don't mean I gone away.

The gun slipped on Emily's temple, and he suddenly knew that if she killed herself, he would die. Maybe not immediately, maybe not with the same blinding pain, but it would happen. You couldn't live for very long without a heart.

Sometimes Chris wished he could sneak a peek at the back of the book, so to speak, and see how it was all going to turn out, so that he wouldn't have to bother going through the motions.

Do you know what it's like to give your whole self to a person, and your whole heart to boot, until you've got nothing left to give-and then realize that it still isn't what they need?

He could stand pain, himself. He just couldn't stand hers.

And ever has it been that love knows not its own depth until the hour of separation. —KAHLIL GIBRAN The Prophet

Do you know what it's like to give your whole self to a person, and your whole heart to boot, until you've got nothing left to give- and then realize that it still isn't whay they need?

To say there had been a loss was ludicrous; one lost a shoe or a set of keys. You did not suffer the death of a child and say there was a loss. There was a catastrophe. A devastation. A hell.

I love you"..."But I made you cry.

When you loved someone, you put their needs before your own.No matter how inconceivable those needs were; no matter how fucked up; no matter how much it made you feel like you were ripping yourself into pieces.

She belonged to me. She was all the things I wasn't. And I was all the things she wasn't. Her hand, it fit mine.

You have a choice. You can just go on the facts and form your own opinions. Or you can hold the truth in your hands, and see it for the gift it is.

Some people spend their whole lives looking for that one person. I was lucky enough to have her all along.

What did you say to the people who had given you life, when you were about to intentionally throw that gift away?

This wasn't the first time he'd be saving her by letting her go.

At seventeen, the smallest crises took on tremendous proportions; someone else's thoughts could take root in the loam of your own mind; having someone accept you was as vital as oxygen.

Librarians were somewhat on a par with God-who else could be bothered with, and better yet, know the answers to so many different types of questions? Knowledge was power, but a good librarian did not hoard the gift. She taught others how to find, where to look, how to see.

And that's what I think love is...when your hindsight's twenty-twenty, and you still wouldn't change a thing.

The mind is a remarkable thing. Just because you can't see the wound doesn't mean it isn't hurting. It scars all the time, but it heals.

...the arms of his swim team sweatshirt still wrapped around the pillow on the bed - Em had said it smelled of him.

I look at you and I see this amazing, beautiful thing. All these books and songs are written about people looking for the love of their life and never fining it, and we've got it and it isn't worth a damn to you.

Being a mother gives you a singular sort of vision, a prism through which you can see your child with many different faces all at once. It is the reason you can watch him shatter a ceramic lamp, and still remember him as an angel.

Just because you can't see the wound doesn't mean it isn't hurting.

She sobbed the way she did everything else- with passion and excess.

This sort of obsessing would get him nowhere. He needed to move on, to get going, to look forward.

...one half leaning in, one half pulling away.

He could stand pain, himself. He just couldn't stand hers

It is very hard to believe you when I'm trying so hard to pretend it never happened.

They sat in the companionable awkwardness caused by knowing extremely private things about each other that had never been directly confided.

Would you rather spend the rest of your life thinking about us, and remembering it as something totally perfect, or would it be better to let it get all screwed up and have that as your memory?

You know, Michael, I used to sit around looking for a way to make sense of what happened, like there was some kind of answer I could find if I just looked hard enough. Then one day I realized that if there had been one, Dave would still be here. And I wondered if this...this feeling that I couldn't figure it all out...was what Dave had been feeling, too.

Librarians, to Melanie, were somewhat in a par with god -- who else could be bothered with, and better yet, know the answers to so many diffrent types of questions? Knowledge was power, but a good librarian did not hoard the gift. She taught others how to fknd, where to look, how to see

I, um, I have this problem. I broke up with my boyfriend, you see. And I'm pretty upset about it, so I wanted to talk to my best friend." She swallowed and looked at the black ground. "The thing is, they're both you.

She has never been a pretty crier. She sobbed the way she did everything else - with passion and excess. That she had managed to keep it inside her this long was astounding to James. He thought of pushing open the half-closed door and kneeling before his wife, wrapping his arms around her shoulders and helping her upstairs. He raised his hand, stroking the wood of the door, planning to say something to calm her. But what wisdom could he offer Gus, when he could not even heed it himself? James walked upstairs again, got into bed, covered his head with a pillow. And hours later, when Gus crept beneath the sheets, he tried to pretend that he did not feel the weight of her grief, lying between them like a fitful child, so solid that he could not reach past it to touch her.

That's what I think love is, when your hindsight's twenty-twenty, and you still wouldn't change a thing.

I went to law school for the same reason everyone else goes to law school: I had no idea what to do with my life and my parents were paying.

Concrete answers came easily; nonchalance didn't.

It wasn't her throat, and it wasn't a fever, but it hurt all the same to be heartbroken.

THE TRUTH and ever has it been that love knows not its own depth until the hour of separation.

As a prosecutor, you've got the burden of proof. As a defense lawyer, all you have to do is introduce a tiny doubt.

He kissed her so gently she wondered if she had imagined it. She pulled back slightly, to look into his eyes. And then there was a shot.

It was an attraction born of close quarters, and false familiarity. It meant absolutely nothing. Yet she drove home one-handed, the fingertips of her free hand gently touching her mouth, whispering, “Beloved.

She was the only one for whom the house didn't have to be cleaned, for whom she didn't have to wear her makeup, and around whom she could say anything without fear of repercussions, or of looking truly stupid.

How could she trust this man, so imprecise with his words, to take care of the burial? To say there had been a loss was ludicrous; one lost a shoe or a pair of keys. You did not suffer the death of a child and say there was a loss. There was a catastrophe. A devastation. A hell.

The way I see it, he's all we have left of her.

They go on to this better place, you know, which is what they wanted all along. But you and me, we're still left behind with all the questions they couldn't answer.

Don't go fighting my battles for me.

Stop trying to act like nothing happened. Because something did, and you can't make it go back to being the same

Do you know what it's like to love someone so much, that you can't see yourself without picturing her? Or what it's like to touch someone?

I told you because I didn't know how not to.

Any smidgen of emotion revealed would crack the careful mask of control and leave the person in pieces.

I'm very sorry - the only words that could not rework into anything but what they signified.

He did not have to read the careful number to know the weight of Emily's heart; he'd held it for years

He kissed her so gently she wondered if she had imagined it

pro-choice’ is a misnomer. There is not really an issue of choice at all. It is against the law to cut short someone’s life, period. To say that a fetus is not a life is to split hairs, since all major bodily systems are in place at the time most abortions are undertaken. To say that it is a woman’s right to choose is also unclear, because it is not only her body but another’s as well. In a society that stands behind the best interests of a child, it seems strange indeed

BEING A MOTHER GIVES YOU a singular sort of vision, a prism through which you can see your child with many different faces all at once. It is the reason you can watch him shatter a ceramic lamp, and still remember him as an angel. Or hold him as he cries, but imagine his smile. Or watch him walk toward you, the size of a man, and see the dimpled skin of an infant.

How could he describe how it felt when she finished his sentences, turned the mug they were sharing so that her mouth landed where his had been? How did he explain the way they could be in a locker room, or underwater, or in the piney woods of Maine, but as long as Em was with him, he was at home?

he would see this moment forever—one of life’s gallery of pictures—

righteousness coursed through her that felt like the few dizzy moments after childbirth, when she had felt simultaneously exhausted and powerful enough to move mountains.

I’ll call

She did not love Chris enough to marry him, but she loved him too much to tell him that.

Who ever loved that loved not at first sight?

For September, it was balmy - Indian summer, the night flung across the sky like sheer gauze, bringing darkness but no weight.

You know," Dr. Feinstein said evenly, "the mind is a remarkable thing. Just because you can't see the wound doesn't mean it isn't hurting. It scars all the time, but it heals.

Their strategy for dealing with things unpleasant or emotional was to push past the mortifying situation and get on with their life as if it had never happened.

She had never been a pretty crier. She sobbed the way she did everything else — with passion and excess.

She especially liked the way his big hands cradled her head, as if he could hold her thoughts together even when they started running off in directions she didn't want to explore.

And that’s what I think love is,” Chris said quietly. “When your hindsight’s twenty-twenty, and you still wouldn’t change a thing.

Do you know what it's like to give your whole self to a person, and your whole heart to boot, until you've got nothing left to give - and then realize it still isn't what they need?

That a lie which is half a truth is ever the blackest of lies; That a lie which is all a lie may be met and fought with outright; But a lie which is part a truth is a harder matter to fight. —ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON

You have to understand—I grew up being told by my parents that the best way to get out of a sticky situation was to assume it didn’t exist,” he said. “Let the rumors fly...if the family isn’t bothered, why should anyone else be?

She had spent her entire life being what everyone wanted her to be. The perfect daughter, the budding artist, the best friend, the first love. She had been so busy meeting everyone’s expectations, in fact, that it had taken her years to remember exactly why it was all one big farce. She was not perfect, far from it, and what you saw on the outside was not what you really were getting. Deep down, she was dirty, and this was the kind of thing that happened to girls like her.

How could he convey to someone who'd never even met her the way she always smelled like rain, or how his stomach knotted up every time he saw her shake loose her hair from its braid? How could he describe how it felt when she finished his sentences, turned the mug they were sharing so that her mouth landed where his had been?

The last time he had done this, when Chris was just a child, he’d hung the signs every twenty feet or so. This time, he hung a sign on every single tree. They rustled in the light wind, a hundred yellow warnings, garish and obscenely festive against the dark trunks. James stepped out on the road to look at his handiwork. He stared at his signs, thinking of amulets carried, of red worn to ward off the Evil Eye, of Hebrews painting lamb’s blood on doorposts, and he wondered what, exactly, he was trying to keep away. THEN 1989 Chris huddled beside Emily, their hands twined together around the telephone receiver. “You’re chicken,” he murmured, as the dial tone swam in his ear. “Am not,” Em whispered. There was a pickup on the other end. Chris felt Emily’s fingers flutter above his wrist. “Hello?” Em lowered her voice. “I’m looking for Mr. Longwanger.