Will And Emery Quotes

Do you think the universe fights for souls to be together? Some things are too strange and strong to be coincidences.

I feel like a part of my soul has loved you since the beginning of everything. Maybe we’re from the same star.

I think I fall in love a little bit with anyone who shows me their soul. This world is so guarded and fearful. I appreciate rawness so much.

You don't need another Human Being to make your life complete, but let's be honest. Having your wounds kissed by someone who doesn't see them as disasters In your soul, but cracks to put their love into, Is the most calming thing In this World.

In friendship we are all debtors. We all owe each other for a thousand small kindnesses, for little moments of grace in the chaos.

Knowing what happens is different from knowing how it happens. And the getting there is the best part.

Not everything is supposed to become something beautiful and long-lasting. Sometimes people come into your life to show you what is right and what is wrong, to show you who you can be, to teach you to love yourself, to make you feel better for a little while, or to just be someone to walk with at night and spill your life to. Not everyone is going to stay forever, and we still have to keep on going and thank them for what they’ve given us.

My dark days made me strong. Or maybe I already was strong, and they made me prove it.

Because with true friends, no one is keeping score. But it still feels good to repay them – even in the tiniest increments.

Even the constellations can see us now: we are seventeen and shattered and still dancing. We have messy, throbbing hearts, and we are stronger than anyone could ever know.

There’s so much more to life than finding someone who will want you, or being sad over someone who doesn’t. There’s a lot of wonderful time to be spent discovering yourself without hoping someone will fall in love with you along the way, and it doesn’t need to be painful or empty. You need to fill yourself up with love. Not anyone else. Become a whole being on your own. Go on adventures, fall asleep in the woods with friends, wander around the city at night, sit in a coffee shop on your own, write on bathroom stalls, leave notes in library books, dress up for yourself, give to others, smile a lot. Do all things with love, but don’t romanticize life like you can’t survive without it. Live for yourself and be happy on your own. It isn’t any less beautiful, I promise.

His eyes are somewhere between gray and blue, and his hair is somewhere between brown and blond, and I am somewhere between hostile and attracted.

Love extra, even if it means you hurt extra,too

Like you had been drowning, and the book was air.

Nothing, not even sadness could be greater than the sum of us.

I think it's the bravest thing in the world - to run straight at love, even knowing how badly you could get hurt.

Gwyn whispered, "I am the rock against which the surf crashes." Nesta straightened at the words, as if they were a prayer and a summons. Gwyn lifted the blade. "Nothing can break me." Cassian's throat tightened, and even from across the ring he could see Nesta's eyes gleaming with pride and pain. Emerie said, "Nothing can break us ." The world seemed to pause at the words. As if it had been following one path and now branched off in another direction. In a hunred years, a thousand, this moment would still be etched in his mind. That he would tell his children, his grandchildren, Right then and there. That was when it all changed. Azriel went wholly still, as if he, too, had felt the shift. As if he, too, were aware that far larger forces peered into that training ring as Gwyn moved.

I want to reach back into my history with a grade-school pink eraser, scrubbing away my decisions like mistakes on a math test. To bad I drew my mistakes in ink.

I want to take the road that no one dares travel, and I want to travel it with you two. No matter what may befall us. Not as Illyrians, not for their titles but as something new . To prove to them, to everyone, that something new and different might triumph over their rules and restrictions.

You can be okay again. Just a different kind of okay than before.

Okay," he said, leaning closer to me. "I have a proposition for you." Dear God, let it be marriage, I thought.

We're all Elizabeths when we need to be.

You're always preparing yourself for the thing that is most likely to happen, instead of hoping for the thing that you most want to happen.

In books, sometimes the foreshadowing is so obvious that you know what’s going to happen. But knowing what happens isn’t the same as knowing how it happens. Getting there is the best part.

Nesta gazed at her friends. And saw pain and sorrow in their tear-streaked faces, but also the openness of letting each other see the broken places deep inside. The understanding that they would not turn away.

Bring me warm rain and dried lavender and you. I want you most of all.

Sometimes we get it wrong the first time. But you only have to get it right once.

You don't need another human being to make your life complete, but let's be honest. Having your wounds kissed by someone who doesn't see them as disasters in your soul but cracks to put their love into is the most calming thing in this world.

I keep wondering if it'll ever hurt less. This...this hole in our lives." "Oh, I imagine it'll hurt less eventually. I think there will always be a hole, though. But lace is one of the most beautiful fabrics, you know. All those holes and gaps, but it's still complete somehow- still lovely.

I dig the toe of my shoe into the dirt. “It’s complicated.” “Is it? Most complicated things in life are actually pretty simple at the core. We put so much extra nonsense in the middle that we can’t even see how easy it really is.

Laughter feels like our flotation device -- it won't pull us out of the storm, but it might carry us through, if we can just hang on.

You are the only person who can build emotional barriers, but you're also the only person who can topple them. Other people can't knock down the walls you've built, no matter how much they love you. You have to tear them down yourself because there's something worth seeing on the other side.

That's the thing they never tell you about love stories: just because one ends, that doesn't mean it failed. A cherry pie isn't a failure just because you eat it all. It's perfect for what it is, and then it's gone. And exchanging the truest parts of yourself--all the things you are--with someone? What a slice of life. One I'll carry with me into every single someday.

Ryan Chase was my eighth-grade collage, aspirational and wide-eyed. But Max was the first bite of grilled cheese on a snowy day, the easy fit of my favorite jeans, that one old song that made it onto every playlist. Peanut-butter Girl Scout cookies instead of an ornate cake. Not glamorous or idealized or complicated. Just me.

I know this feeling of being a ghost in your own life - no one sees you, no one feels you, so you stay still as if you could actually disappear at any moment.

It's an understandable impulse, to be on the floor when everything is falling apart, like you just want to feel the solid ground beneath you. When you're on the floor, there's nowhere farther to fall.

He's the 'him' in every sentence that really matters; he's the 'he' in every song.

But the point is that trying to make things better sometimes makes us better, too. The point is I'm trying to create good things in the midst of the bad. Grief or no grief. And in my case, it's still somewhere in between.

Kiss your own fingertips and hug your own curves. You are made of waves and honey and spicy peppers when it is necessary. You are a goddess, I hope you haven’t forgotten.

Be kind to yourself while blooming. I know sometimes it feels like your soul doesn’t always fit. It’s all a part of the process.

Darkness might keep flooding in, but I finally had just enough light to find the way back to myself.

If we could capture feelings like we capture pictures, none of us would ever leave our rooms. It would be so tempting to inhabit the good moments over and over again. But I don't want to be the kind of person who lives backwardly, who memorializes moments before she's finished living in them. So I plant my feet here on this hillside beside a boy who is undoing me, and I kiss him back like I mean it. And, God help me, with the sky wrapped around us in every direction, I do mean it.

I know it's difficult to bare your heart, but it's the least stupid thing in the world.

Live your life.

I drink coffee for the taste, of course, since caffeine is the last thing I need. Most of the things I do in life are for flavor, not necessity

This past year has been a lesson in letting go and holding on, and I don't know what to make of it. I guess I do know this: find a best friend, and hang on tight.

Finally, mutually, and completely, they released all doubts, abandoned all fears, unwilling and unable to deny this overpowering love.

No matter what heaven you believe in, your time on this earth will end. What I’m saying is that you should listen—really listen—to the slosh of the waves and the distant call of Pacific birds. You should feel a boy’s pulse against your cheek; you should fill your lungs with ocean air. While you can, I mean. You should do these things while you still can.

Maybe we were dying planets, Jonah, being drawn into the darkness.” I hold my right palm against his cheek, and I wish I could touch him with both my hands. “When we collided, we bounced each other back into orbit. And now we have to do that—we have to return to our own paths because that’s what we gave each other.

Dammit Bard, you're going to set the cat on fire.

to love is to have ancient wounds exposed to vicious winds and be caressed instead of burned

Dee says that phrases in songs are like beads in a necklace – they should stand on their own, but they make the most sense together.

I swear his looks are pure Darwinism. If he wasn't so cute, someone would have killed him for being annoying by now.

Stop documenting the moment for a second, he told me. Just be in it.

I think I've loved you since that first day.

This is the currency of friendship, traded over years and miles, and I hope it's an even exchange someday. For now, I do what all best friends do when there's nothing left to say. We lie together in all the darkness, shoulder to shoulder, and wait for the worst to be over.

Fill yourself up with love. Become a whole being on your own. Go on adventures, fall asleep in the woods with friends, wander around the city at night, sit in a coffee shop on your own, write on bathroom stalls, leave notes in library books, dress up for yourself, give to others, smile a lot. Live for yourself and be happy on your own.

Mysteries are always more exciting than truths

Hasn't Daybreak shown me, day after day, that people can outlast unbelievable pain? That human hearts are like noble little ants, able to carry so much more weight than you'd expect.

Because I've recently learned, in a very painful way, that life is short. And I don't want to waste my time with anyone who would make me feel...happy enough." He pauses,searching my face. "I'd rather duke it out with someone who makes me feel everything.

The point is that we already know it doesn’t work out, but we reread them anyway, because the good stuff that comes before the ending is worth it.” This

My cheeks are wet, but oh, my heart—it is so full.

You can ache for where you come from, and it's homesickness. A relationship, and it's heartbreak. But is there a word for missing your friends like that?

I'm looking for somekind of permanence, so my mark will linger on the world once I'm gone, in the places where I found joy.." -Page 81

She’d tell her daughters someday: ‘If you don’t feel safe enough to yell back, you’re not safe enough. My babies, that is not love.

I’m often difficult to love. I go through dark periods like the moon and I hide from myself. But I promise I will kiss your wounds when they’re hurting. Even if they’re in your soul, I can find them with the light in my fingertips. I will lead you to the river so you can remember how beautiful it feels to be moved by something that is out of your control. And when our dark periods match, we can breathe with the grass and look at the night sky. The stars will remind us of the beauty in our struggles and we won’t feel lost.

It certainly seems like it’s your shop,” he said at last, turning his attention back to her. Emerie had drifted a few feet away, her back straight, chin upraised. He’d seen Nesta in that particular pose, too. He called it her I Will Slay My Enemies pose.

I think I might love you too. Oh, please. You do.

It takes a long time to learn someone. It takes a long time to see a person as a whole spectrum, from worst to best—from the mismanaged heartache that lands them in AA to the pancake dinners, from the hurtful things shouted in a dressing room to the huge-hearted strength that only a best friend can understand. Once you get there, it’s forever.

So, how'd you know about this place?" "One of my buddies is from Baltimore area - I texted him." "Saying what? 'Hey dude, know any secluded places?' He probably thinks you're a serial killer." "I think I said 'romantic and private'.

I may be stumbling through these steps, but at least I'm stumbling forward.

Whose empire did you just overthrow?" My own.

And I say a final last prayer, this one in gratitude that there are people in the world who will protect kids with a fire that makes them sprint after cars, fight systems, curse with rage. It's enough to make you believe. Maybe not in symbols; maybe not in gods. But certainly in people.

Strawberry milk,” I say, eyeing him as we head toward the counter. “Really.” He turns to me. “Do you have something to say about my snack selections?” “Nope.” I fall into line behind him. “I just didn’t realize you were a middle-school girl going to a slumber party.” “And I,” he says, plunking his strawberry-fest down on the counter, “didn’t realize you were a soccer mom justifying her chocolate craving with the fact that raisins are a fruit.

Maybe in my next life, I'll be a wave in the ocean, and you'll be a mountain, and we'll spend years and years brushing up against each other. You'll shift so painfully slowly, and some days I'll crash right into you and other days I'll approach gently, licking your sides. That sounds like us, doesn't it?

I believe in nature, in science, in jazz, in dancing. And I believe in people. In their resilience, in their goodness. This is my credo; this is my hymn. Maybe it's not enough for heaven, and maybe I'm even wrong. But if I can walk through the fire and, with blistered skin, still have faith in better days? I have to believe that's good enough.

Viv, I just made you wild-caught Alaskan salmon baked with mango chutney, on a bed of garlic red potatoes and arugula. While talking about an Audrey Hepburn movie. I think you are maybe falling in love with me.

Human hearts are like noble little ants, able to carry so much more weight than you'd expect.

If I could stay in one moment of time it would be this one – You sitting across the room with the warm lamplight soaking you, looking at me the way softened and still hungry people do.

Try as you may, you can never defy love.

Oh, you know I'm only human; I bend and fall and break You cut me and I bleed I'm a mess for you to make So forget the words and give me deeds My heart was yours to take.

We all owe each other for a thousand small kindnesses, for little moments of grace in the chaos.

From beside me, Matt says, "I think I've got your number." "I wouldn't give you my number." He smiles. "No, I mean...I think I've got you figured out." "I knew what you meant.

He grinned. "I knew you loved me, Tessa." Tessa's cheeks reddened. "One more word, and I WILL have Morgan give you the consent lecture.

I've never felt stronger than when I was packing up my room at Richard's place. [...] I've also never felt sadder. Sad but strong. You can be both. And I am.

I think there will always be a hole, though. But lace is one of the most beautiful fabrics, you know. All those holes and gaps, but it's still complete somehow--still lovely.

Every girl wants to be Dorothy Gale or maybe Glinda. I never wanted to be the tornado.

Yeah, you get a gift basket," Ellie says. "Because depression fucking sucks.

After all, once there was a girl named Lucy who loved her family, old and new. It's not the type of love that ends.

What?" I ask. He looks startled out of his thoughts. "What do you mean what?" "I mean, just then," I say, "that look on your face. What were you thinking about?" "I was thinking...that if I were going to kiss you, now would be a good time. Fireworks and all. Typical songwriter, always looking for poetic parallels.

I wanted to live in Lucy and Ricky’s world, where the blunders of life were righted in one neat half hour. They made it look easy.

After all, the night sky is a mess of stars -- a million fireflies crammed into infinity. But the mess becomes a map once you know how to use it.

I vaguely remember a story about a woman who looked back while fleeing a broken city. She turned into a pillar of salt. A harsh fate, but I got the point. You can’t look back when you’re escaping disaster. You can’t hope that someone will come after you, either.

Rhy felt Alucard’s eyes wandering slowly, hungrily, over him, and he blushed. The heat started in his face and spread down, through his collar, his chest, beneath shirt and belt. It was disconcerting; Rhy might not have magic, but when it came to conquests, he was used to holding the power—things happened at his whim, and at his pleasure. Now he felt that power falter, slip. In all of Ames, there was only one person capable of flustering the prince, of reducing him from a proud royal to a nervous youth, and that was Alucard Emery. Misfit. Rogue. Privateer. And royal.

I'm going to spend my whole summer changing the expressions on Jonah Daniels's face.

I don’t remember that.” He shook his head. “Of course you don’t. You were in another world, completely occupied with whatever you were reading.

The world moves twice as fast. Or twice as slow. It’s hard to tell when it feels like you’re watching your own life instead of living it.

Yes, my boy, you are indeed much faster, bigger, and stronger than me and an altogether superior speciman of God's creation, but I have seen your like before. Only one of us can be master, and it won't be you.

Emery cut in impatiantly, "For crying out loud. Who do you think you are, Nancy Drew?" Hey," I snapped, because no one sniped at my sister but me, and Mark echoed with a stern "Chill, dude." Phin was unperturbed. "Those books were highly unrealistic. Do you have any idea how much brain damage a person would have if she were hit on the head and drugged with chloroform that often?

In the moments when I feel like being truly happy is an impossible puzzle, one I'm not meant to figure out, if you have a best friend you can laugh with and a few good songs you're more than halfway there.

Curse Emery Thane for being such a difficult man to rescue!

That's the thing they never tell you about love stories: just because one ends, that doesn't mean it failed.

The glow of my birthday candles and the fairy lights would have been more than enough. But Jonah Daniels? He lit up my whole world.

I don’t know how many women can claim to have walked a man’s heart, but I’ve walked yours, Emery Thane. And I like the dog.

Emery gives me a rock that she's colored on. She whispers in my ear. "You can smash people's fingers with it when they're mean.

There comes a time when you just have to put on some mascara and pull yourself together.

Summer crushes happen all the time, right? Because you feel far away from the real world, everything seems more...possible. Every person seems more vital.

The great opposition to reading is what I allow to fill my time instead of reading. To say we have no time to read is not really true; we simply have chosen to use our time for other things, or have allowed our time to be filled to the exclusion of reading. So don't add reading to your to-do list. Just stop doing the things that keep you from doing it. But read.

When his eyes land on me, something about his expression changes—like he recognizes me from somewhere, too. I look back, appraising him quickly. He’s kind of beautiful, in an understated, comfortable-looking way—the kind of guy who doesn’t mind seeing a rom-com with you and gives you his hoodie when you’re cold.

I almost try to explain another untranslatable word--sunyata--to Jonas. The idea has Buddhist roots and several meanings, depending on context. I think emptiness is the closest word, but, in English, we infer emptiness as a void, a lack. Sunyata is open with possibility, a meditative space.

And exchanging the truest parts of yourself--all the things you are--with someone? What a slice of life. One I'll carry with me into every single someday.

It was easy for me to be honest with him because there was nothing to lose.

I wanted him for myself, but I want adventure for him, too—and for me.

I’ve been arguing on the side of a dirt road with a petulant singer who’s wearing a guitar on his back. This entire scene is a mess, and maybe we’re a mess, too. But it’s still him and still me, and there’s still that feeling of possibility—the one that sparks like a Roman candle inside me as his lips touch mine. And it’s a start.

And that's why I don't get to cry, I guess. Because they do. Because we're older but we're not the grown-ups who seem too far away to understand. I tuck that thought inside me, warm and small like balled hands inside hoodie pockets. Beneath the beech trees and sugar maples, feet crunching against dead leaves, I hope for strength. Because as much as I want to be the one crying, I want to be the kind of person someone can hold onto.

Councillor Emery sighed. “You’re not going to make this easy, are you?” “I’m pretty sure that’s my job,” Sophie countered. “As the moonlark?” Councillor Alina asked with a notable scoff in her voice. Sophie smiled sweetly at her. “As a teenager.

I’m never fucking deserting you, Harper.” His voice is so low I can hear my own heart pounding. “Deal with it.” Then he crashes his lips against mine. But Xavier Emery doesn’t just kiss you. Xavier Emery owns you.

But life is not evens and odds and solving for x. And sadness? Sadness is an equation made of all variables.

More of my life has been affected by his absence than his presence, and that's a strange thing to deal with.

Everything else will fall into place. Just live your life.

This was never about getting there fast. This was about being sure of my steps forward. They always call it falling in love, but for me? It was also a choice.

But my mom says the best revenge is living well, and I believe her.

That's the thing about love stories: Just because one ends, that doesn't mean it failed. A cherry pie isn't a failure just because you eat it all. It's perfect for what it is, and then it's gone. And exchanging the truest parts of yourself - all the things you are - with someone? What a slice of life. One I'll carry with me into every single someday. I lie down in the cool grass beside him as planets collide above us and we stay like this for a long time, down to every last crumb. My cheeks are wet, but oh, my heart - it is so full.

I am the rock against which the surf crashes.” Nesta straightened at the words, as if they were a prayer and a summons. Gwyn lifted the blade. “Nothing can break me.” Cassian’s throat tightened, and even from across the ring, he could see Nesta’s eyes gleaming with pride and pain. Emerie said, “Nothing can break us.” The world seemed to pause at the words. As if it had been following one path and now branched off in another direction. In a hundred years, a thousand, this moment would still be etched in his mind. That he would tell his children, his grandchildren, Right then and there. That was when it all changed.

I used to think rewatching and rereading were embarrassingly boring pastimes. But there is something to be said for how comforting it is to already know what happens. There is no such luxury in real life. Soon

Have you reached the peak of the mountain? Is it everything you'd hope it would be? I think if we were trees we'd be willows and we'd let children swing on our branches. I'm whispering into the air hoping you will hear me: Your soul is my soul's home

I don't have it all planned yet, but we'll figure it out. It won't be easy, but it'll be worth it. I love you, Emerie. I'd go three hundred sixty-four days thirsty if it meant I got to drink you in for just one.

Over time, this unspoken attration continued to blossom, refusing to dwindle or fade, though they had little opportunity to foster or nourish it. Slowly and patiently, Robert's sheer persistence in the chase had revealed his heart, and Charlotte came to realize the nameless thing between them was love.

You cannot fault a captain for wanting to know about his crew." "And you cannot fault a thief for keeping secrets out of reach." "You have trouble with trust, Delilah Bard.

They were alone, the captain and the sleeping prince.

And just like that, we're on our way to everywhere

I’d rather carry on a conversation with myself than crawl the trenches of awkward nothingness.

You have a big life ahead of you, sweet girl. And beginning again gets easier with each step.

I'm a basket case, I thought. Who gets emotional over two letters? But then I remembered that "no" also only has two letters. Almost everyone in the world has cried over those.

There I was, clinging to the scraps of happiness that I could finally feel again: coffee and books and an afternoon with my best friend. What right did I have, when he was gone?

Shit. I want that stupid song to be about me.

I think it's the bravest thing in the world...to run straight at love, even knowing how badly you could get hurt.

The notes waft out of the guitar like weightless dandelion seeds.

I wasn't even looking for him, so why do I feel found?

A half smile from Jackson Emery felt like so much more than the average person’s full-blown grin.

We know there are three little words branded inside my heart: Jonah was here.

Jonah looks at me like I'm absolutely off my rocker. Or maybe it's a look of amazement, like I'm a whole galaxy, glittering and vast and unchartered.

Depression, it settles like a shadow over your body while you sleep, and it mutes every frequency into blankness, into fog. Everyone things you can't laugh when you're depressed, but I couldn't cry either, because I couldn't FEEL.

Howidoono?” Dee tries to ask, but there’s a mound of Brown Butter Almond Brittle ice cream on her tongue. “How did you know I needed this?” He gives her an “oh please” look. “I have a sister and a girl best friend. This is not amateur hour.

You change as you get older, especially at this time in your life. You become more yourself, hopefully. And sometimes that changes the dynamic, even with people you love. So it's not that you were wrong. You were right for that time. But you grow up and you grow out of relationships. Even the ones you thought, at one point, might be forever.” .

Sure, QuizBowl wasn't a cool activity to join and, yeah, the idea of answering difficult questions in front of an audience terrified me. But it wasn't anything like the fear that accompanied my drowning nightmare - harrowing and visceral. No, this fear made me feel fizzy. Hopeful. In fact, this fear felt like waking up do discover I am still here.

Later in my room, I lift up my dress and twist to see the rainbow splotch of lotus on my side. And it occurs to me, what if I stopped hating it? What if the tattoo and the scar and this summer's freckles are my patina? Wabi-Sabi says rust and faded paint hold beauty. So what if I let these marks be passport stamps from where I've been - one's that don't determine a damn thing about where I'm going next?

Here is something I never expected to feel: love at first sight for an entire family. But life suprises you. It tells you to close your eyes and blow out the candles, and then sometimes smashes your face into the cake before you can even make a wish. But! Sometimes, every once in a while, you get your wish in. You wish for a boy to spend the summer with, and instead life gives you his whole beauiful family.

Imagine the terrestrial timespan as an outstretched arm: a single swipe of an emery-board, across the nail of the third finger, erases human history. We haven't been around for very long. And we've turned the earth's hair white. Sh e seemed to have eternal youth but now she's ageing awful fast, like an addict, like a waxless candle. Jesus, have you seen her recently? we used to live and die without any sense of the planet getting older, of mother earth getting older, living and dying. We used to live outside history. But now we're all coterminous. We're inside history now all right, on its leading edge, with the wind ripping past our ears. Hard to love, when you're bracing yourself for impact. And maybe love can't bear it either, and flees all planets when they reach this condition, when they get to the end of their twentieth centuries.

Our town was too big for people to know everything about you, but just small enough to clench down on one defining moment like teeth on prey. Won the spelling bee in fourth grade? You are Dictionary Girl forever. Laughed a little too hard in sixth grade? You will still be the Guy Who Peed His Pants as you walk across the stage to receive your diploma. And I was the Girl Whose Boyfriend Drowned.

That day I realized that at least for the time being, I was becoming Christian’s somebody. And maybe, just maybe, he was becoming mine.

I couldn't master this kind of apathy, no matter how hard I tried. I was built to care - to notice, to overanalyze, to try - in a way that felt inalterable.

It was the baptism of myself, the renewal of me and by me. The water felt, finally, like it could wash away the dust of the past, cleaning off the second skin of sadness.

When it all closes in, there are only two kinds of people: best friends and everyone else.

Beginning again gets easier with each step.

She made me wish for something I’d never wanted before. To be the hero in someone’s fairy tale instead of the villain.

... never engage to play with a troubled mind or excited emotions. Lucidity of mind is crucial and once once's emotions become engaged in the play all is lost.....

I want to reach back into my history with a grade-school pink eraser, scrubbing away my decisions like mistakes on a math test. Too bad I drew my mistakes in ink.

True vice, my lady, would frighten us all, if it did not wear the mask of virtue. (p.56)

God," he mutters. "Most girls love it when I write them a song." "Well, I'm not most girls," I snap at him

I can't surround myself with people who are hiding their pain beneath swagger and a grin.

God brought us to the water," [Emery] breathed as she struggled. "No, I took us to the water.

Most complicated things in life are actually pretty simple at the core. We put so much extra nonsense in the middle that we can’t even see how easy it really is.

It's too damn hard to watch someone else get what you want.

When does it stop-the longing to be mothered?

I'd like to see everything for myself, doctor. The whole world.

right. Knowing what happens is different from knowing how it happens. And the getting there is the best part.

A quiet realization would be more poetic—something as quotidian as showing back up. Choosing each other when there's no fanfare.

We sat there in our flower crowns until the world went dark, until we were half-sick from sugar but still laughing, laughing, laughing like the almost-invincible girls we were. Happy

I wondered how we looked to the rest of the world. Young and silly, probably. I often had the distinct feeling that strangers watched us with annoyance, teenage girls with cotton candy lives. They could think that—that we were frothy and carefree. Would they ever guess how strong we were from carrying each other?

Like a wounded soldier Trudging the old road home, But I ain’t the old me, And I walk this path alone. I’m battle-worn, I’m battle-torn With these scars inside my chest, Kept up that happy face for you, To hide that I’m a mess. But I gave you every ounce of fight in me, And I have no regrets. If I was going to lose you, At least I lost you to my best. But it felt so wrong, So tangled up in blue, Like that old Dylan song, Like I don’t know who I am, Now that you’re gone. But I lived through the pain. Now I see the other side. Now I know that life’s too short To shut myself down and hide. I’m battle-torn, but I’m battle-born. These scars are part of me. I got nothing left but what I’ve learned, And I’ll use that, and you’ll see, I can still give every ounce of fight in me, Till I have no regrets, Because if I’m going to lose someone, I’m gonna lose her to my best. And I’ll be strong, When a hard rain’s a-gonna fall, Like that old Dylan song, You’re the reason I stand tall, And that will never be gone.

I don't mind being introduced to people's skeletons firsthand, in person. I more than don't mind it. I prefer to reach right into the closet and shake their bony hands and say hello for myself.

They made me one of them, a part of a family in a way I never had been before. Beyond gratitude and obligation, I chose them. I chose them because they love me, because they accept me, and maybe because they’re wild and rowdy. Maybe because they brought me to my mother. And I still choose them. They brought me to him, and for that, they’ll always have my loyalty. Because he was my salvation.

Tglhe heart is such a strange little beast - a lump of thick muscles with pipes sticking out. Sometimes I think my heart is made of rubber, and the world Stretches it and twists it so that it writhes in my chest and aches. This is why I have spent most of my time on this this planet here but hurting. Sometimes I think a heart of porcelain would be easier. Let it drop out of my rib cage and break on the floor, no heartbeat, the end. Instead, I get a bouncy heart That bleeds when the world claws at it but keeps beating through the pain.

I've prowled the dirtiest back alleys of sadness, okay? And I know what it's like to fight for your life on those mean streets. So if you need someone to vent to or someone to be quiet with or someone to talk your ear off, I can be that person. I'm not scared of the dark places.

What time is it?" Brad stretches, arms still around my waist; and yawns, his breath is blowing in my face. I grimace. He really needs a toothbrush, or a breath mint. Maybe a routine cleaning wouldn't be such a bad idea.

I love math because there's always a right answer. It's not interpretive; it's not subjective. There is a correct destination, even if you have to hack through confusing parts to get there. That's not always true in life.

I don't appreciate how often people hide their scars and doubts. Really, it's not fair to people who are struggling, to go on believing that everyone else just has it totally together and never has one bad thought in their lives. Like, I know you people sometimes lie awake at night torturing yourself over the atrocities in this world and morality and meaning. I know you're not just dreaming about riding a pink pony to your job as a cupcake taster.

And I want to be one of them. I want to be one of them so, so badly - to fit into this balance, their history, the wolf pack way of them. I see it now, why my mom wants that for me. I see how you can't help but want it, if you get close enough to witness a group of friends knitted together like this.

Kell's eyes went to the palace on last time, and he thought he could almost make out the shape of a man standing alone on a high balcony. At this distance, he was little more than a shadow, but Kell could see the band of gold glinting in his hair as a secong figure came to stand beside the king. Rhy raised his hand, and so did Kell, a single unspoken word between them. Anoshe.

I remember looking at him like he was mental for suggesting to kiss my bloody knee, and he laughed at the realization. Then he grabbed my face, wiped a tear rolling down my cheek… And kissed me instead. Believe me when I say that shut me right up. Xavier Emery was my first kiss. But he’s still an asshole.

Viv: I don't really know how to break this to you. But I think you are maybe falling in love with me. Jonah: Viv, I just made you wild-caught Alaskan salmon baked with mango chutney, on a bed of garlic red potatoes ans arugula. While talking about an Audrey Hepburn movie. I think you are maybe falling in love with me.

I see it all through the lens of my camera—the flurry of movement, the venue staff in black T-shirts, giving orders into their headsets. As I take it all in, my mind weighs the texture, the composition, the possibility of each changing scene, and I struggle to hold back, to keep my finger from pressing too soon. That’s my biggest flaw as a photographer. I’m impatient—trigger-happy. I want the shot now, now, now, click, click, click, and if I could just wait a second more, the moment would really flourish.

There's so much more to life than finding someone who will want you, or being sad over someone who doesn't. There's a lot of time to be spent discovering yourself without hoping someone will fall in love with you along the way, and it doesn't need to be painful or empty. You need to fill yourself up with love. Not anyone else. Become a whole new being on your own. Go on adventures, fall asleep in the woods with your friends, wander around the city at night, sit in a coffee shop on your own, write on bathroom stalls, leave notes in library books, dress up for yourself, give to others, smile a lot. Do all things with love but don't romanticize life like you can't survive without it. Live for yourself and be happy on your own. It isn't any less beautiful, I promise.

Girl, you're as hot as your temper, And you won't let me through. But I think you would be good for me. I know I'd be good for you. Oh, but then that night at the lake, You said we'd be a mistake. But you're wrong there, honey. I'm a chance you wanna take. Do you want me to beg you? Do you want me to say please? Then this song is the rest of my pride, girl, This song is me down on my knees. Just give in, give in to me, girl. I'll give you everything I've got. I won't give up, give up on you, girl, Till you're giving me a shot. So go on, pretend you can fight it, Walk away like I'm not in your head. Brush me off like I never cross your mind At night as you lay down in bed. Till you're giving me a shot. C'mon, girl, give me a shot, One shot. I'll give you everything I've got...

No matter what heaven you believe in, your time on this Earth will end. What I'm saying is that you should listen--really listen--to the slosh of the waves and the distant call of Pacific birds. You should feel a boy's pulse against your cheek; you should fill your lungs with ocean air. While you can, I mean. You should do these things while you still can.

It's been the longest time Since I've been in this place, Where I spend my whole day Hoping I'll see your face. Then I script things to say, And maybe what you'd say back. You don't know it yet, But, girl, it's a fact That I can see us Staying up late, Talking all night, But I guess I'll have to wait. 'Cause it's brand-new, Yeah, I know we just met. I want to be there with you, But not just yet. Girl, you've got that look, Like you're hard to impress. So I'm bumbling with words, 'Cause my mind is a mess. You were out of the blue And you caught me by surprise, With a slight smile, that long stare, And a challenge in your eyes I could feel all this In that single look, Like you could see my soul. You could read me like a book, And I think it's something. Though I know we just met, I'm gonna get there with you. You just don't know it ... yet.

My dark days made me strong. Or maybe I already was strong, and they made me prove it. Jonah Daniels has his own grief, but he doesn't understand what it feels like to waste away in a castle dungeon where you have been chained to crumbling walls. And, when the dragons close in, you only think: Good. Let this be over.

I've always fixated on the things I want in my life--paint palettes and sumptuous fabrics and star-flecked skies and dancing on my tiptoes and the smell of jasmine. But I usually imagine myself alone or falling in love with all kinds of different people. These days, I've started to daydream of the permanent relationships I want to have. Friends who stay in my life forever. People who I trust to love me even if I'm wobbling--the way I trust Jonah. And if that's what I want, then I have scorched Earth to till and replant. I have a Japanese maple seedling, and I have seen how beautiful a rooted life can be. But I have miles to go before I decide where to plant us.

The point is that we already know it doesn't work out, but we reread them anyway, because the good stuff that comes before the ending is worth it.' ... 'Also! In books, sometimes the foreshadowing is so obvious that you know what's going to happen. But knowing WHAT happens isn't the same as knowing HOW it happens. Getting there is the best part.

He and Anna lay facing each other, Staines lying on his left hip, and Anna, on her right, both of them with their knees drawn up to their chests, Staines with one hand tucked beneath his bandaged shoulder, Anna with one hand tucked beneath her cheek. She must have turned toward him, some time in the night: her left arm was flung outward, her fingers reaching, her palm turned down... Devlin came closer...He looked down at Anna and Emery, their mirrored bodies, facing in. They were breathing in tandem. So they are lovers, he thought, looking down at them. So they are lovers, after all. He knew it from the way that they were sleeping.

He's only nineteen, and I hope he doesn't see me as too young for him. That would ruin my plans to flirt with him – not to start something up, of course, just to flirt for the hell of it. It's a law of nature, like a cat with something shiny; dangle it in front of her long enough and eventually she'll paw at it. Only in this case, I'm the cat and Matt is something shiny. The pawing part is the same.

Straining to hear, I can make out something acoustic. Coming from...the backyard? I glance down from my bedroom window and feel my jaw fall open. Matt Finch is standing below my window, guitar strapped across his chest. I pull my window up, and I expect the song from that old movie - the one about a guy with a trench coat and the big radio and his heart on his sleeve. But it's not that. It's not anything I recognise, and I strain to make out the lyrics: Stop being ridiculous, stop being ridiculous, Reagan. What an asshole. The mesh screen and two floors between us don't seem like enough to protect him from my anger. "Nice apology," I call down to him. "I've apologised thirteen times," he yells back, "and so far you haven't called me back." I open my mouth to say it doesn't matter, but he's already redirecting the song. "Now I'm gonna stand here until you forgive me," he sings loudly, "or at least until you hear me out, la-la, oh-la-la. I drove seven hours overnight, and I won't leave until you come out here." (...) "This is private property!" My throat feel coarse from how loudly I'm yelling. "And that doesn't even rhyme!" The guitar chord continues as he sings, "Then call the cops, call the cops, call the cops..." I storm downstairs, my feet pounding against the staircase. When I turn the corner, my dad looks almost amused from his seat in the recliner. Noticing my expression, he stares back at his newspaper, as if I won't notice him. (...) "Dad. How did Matt know which window was mine?" "Well..." he peeks over the sports section. "I reckon I told him." "You talked to him?" My voice is no longer a voice. It's a shriek. "God, Dad!" He juts out his chin, defensive. "How was I supposed to know you had some sort of drama with him? He shows up, lookin' to serenade my daughter. Thought it seemed innocent enough. Sweet, even. Old-fashioned." "It's not any of those things! I hate him!

FROM A WILD NIGHT'S BRIDE by Victoria Vane: His gaze glued to the bed, Ned made a mechanical backward retreat to the center of the room where he had a clearer prospect of its crowning glory. His vision rose to the top of the headboard, to the heraldic shield seated betwixt the carved figures of a lion and a unicorn. His gaze slid with dread to the engraved scroll beneath. Dieu Et Mon Driot. God and my right, the motto of the king. His chest seized. The room began to spin. He looked to Phoebe, aware that the blood was draining from his face, and that his voice emerged as a strangled sound. "May the same God save me...for I'm going to be hung, drawn, and quartered for spending last night rutting in the King of England's bed!" coming April 27, 2012 from Breathless Press

It's okay," he says, eyes closed. He's not even awake. "It's okay." He says these words even in his sleep, like he has said them so often that it's his mouths default sentiment. All this pain in his life, all this care he doles out to everyone else. And yet he still cracks his broken heart open even wider-wide enough to fit me, too. I wonder how much this must hurt him, the toll it must take to give more of himself to me when he already has so little left to give.

Sometimes I think everyone should be handed a manual for this stuff when they turn fourteen. That seems like a good age. Starting high school. Staring at the business end of your childhood, when you have to start growing up. So maybe the school should distribute a book called The Field Guide for Broken People. Between Vivi and me alone, we could write a bunch of chapters. Dead Dad. No Dad. Despondent Mom. Flaky Mom. But each broken person is different, and there is no right way for everyone. Just a lot of wrong ways.

She had learned how to make the bandages during the second month of her apprenticeship after accidentally walking in on Emery in the privy while he was trimming his hair over the sink. Her embarrassment at seeing the privy occupied, as well as seeing Emery shirtless, had startled her so greatly that she hadn’t taken the time to remove her fingers from the doorframe before slamming the door closed, all while shouting a profuse apology. She had nearly broken her right middle finger in the process, and Emery had crafted one of these bandages to hasten its healing.

My phone dings and before I can pick it up, it dings several more times. I catch sly grins and snickers in my direction from my 'friends' and I just know that this can not be good. I check my phone to find that there's several updates on Facebook. Oh, no. [Bradley Patrick is marrier to Colleen Frasier Patrick)] [Bradely Patrick likes Colleen Frasier Patrick's status] My eyes grown wide and I see that all of my 'friends' like my status. But I haven't been on Facebook since we left Boston. What the fuck? And why has my name changed! [Colleen Frasier Patrick is having lunch with 'the hubs' Bradley Patrick] Who hacked my Facebook account? I glare around at each of them. I can't tell who did it. They all look guilty. I try to log into my account, but the password has been changed. Who changed my password? I know I'm screaming but I can't stop myself. They all burst out laughing.

I have no idea what you’re talking about.” I spin to leave. “No fucking way.” It clicks in his mind. “Little Vee?” Here he is. “You’re that girl Finn and I used to…” He doesn’t complete his sentence, but I know all too well what he was going to say. “Annoy? Tease? Torture? Why, yes, that would be me. Did you seriously just figure that out? A bit slow, are we?” I snark. My outburst only seems to amuse him. “Look, in my defense, your mom only ever called you ‘Vee.’ I thought it was short for Vicky or Vivian or something. And it was ten years ago. I can’t even remember what I had for dinner last night.” “Whatever.” I shrug. “Shit, I’ve got to say, Vee.” He gives me a once-over. “Puberty did you a solid.” My cheeks combust. “Wish I could say the same about you,” I lie through my teeth. Xavier smiles at my failed attempt to deny the undeniable. Let’s not pretend like puberty didn’t do every female on earth a solid when Xavier Emery went from “cute” to “sinfully hot” in the span of a summer. “I think you mispronounced thank you.” He flashes a smug grin that makes me want to knee him where it hurts.

Something tells me that you sneak bars up to your room a lot. In fact, you probably have a whole little shoebox dedicated to them.” “Wrong.” “I don’t think I am. Tell the truth, Emery. Do you hoard chocolate bars?” “Eww! Hoarding makes it sound gross. It’s not like I collect them or anything. I just keep a few on hand when the craving hits.” “And how often is that?” He’s pushing me. It’s evident by the grin on his face, but there’s something about the way his eyes are lighting up, the first time they’ve done it since he got here today, that makes me wanna answer him just to keep it going. I like the way he is right now. It’s much better than the tense and angry way he was before. “Every single day.” I admit and along with the smile comes a thick rumble of laughter. “So, you admit you have a problem. That’s the first step. Now that you’ve admitted it, I can properly treat you.” “And how do you plan on doing that?” “You solemnly swear never to take home and hide another chocolate bar, and I’ll make sure that every day, you have your daily dose of it.