It was like a dream you might have after death in which lost people came back to life, your friends loved you again no matter what you had done, and your failures were unaccountably forgiven.
Ann BrasharesParents were the only ones obligated to love you; from the rest of the world you had to earn it.
Ann BrasharesI'm not going anywhere without you. We're swimming to China together. And if the worst happens, I'm dying with you before I'm living without you.
Ann BrasharesShe'd cried over a broken heart before. She knew what that felt like, and it didn't feel like this. Her heart felt not so much broken as just ... empty. It felt like she was an outline empty in the middle. The outline cried senselessly for the absent middle. The past cried for the present that was nothing.
Ann Brashares