How sad it was, Carmen thought, that you acted awful when you were desperately sad and hurt and wanted to be loved. How tragic then, the way everyone avoided you and tiptoed around you when you really needed them. Carmen knew this vicious predicament as well as anyone in the world. How bitter it felt when you acted badly to everyone and ended up hating yourself the most.

Maybe, sometimes, it's easier to be mad at the people you trust because you know they'll always love you, no matter what.

But like everything else, love changed.

I agree that a love of reading is a great gift for a parent to pass on to his or her child.

Sometimes you couldn’t face the sadness of being forgotten until you felt the comfort of being remembered again.

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.

He could lose himself in her forever, he thought.