She'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.

Lena always described how she dreaded and mourned things before they even happened. Carmen was beginning to suspect that she was permitting herself to mourn this long separation only now that it was over.

Shy” was the sympathetic interpretation she got from older people. “Snotty” was the interpretation she got from people her own age.

There are some people who fall in love over and over.

Love yourself and your friends unconditionally .

There are moments in your life when the big pieces slide and shift. Sometimes the big changes dong happen gradually but all at once. That's how it was for us. That was the day we discovered that friends can do things for you that your parents can't.

There was nothing new in sitting on this dock, on this or that wooden bench, watching for his boat to come. In some ways, she was always waiting for him.