The problem is not the problem. The problem is your attitude about the problem. Got that? -Coach Brevin

He didn't seem to realize that three excuses was as good as no excuse.

The weather turned. Her skin seemed to grow a million extra pores, and all of them opened to take in the warmth and tenderness of the air. The sun on her face made her want to cry. Into all those millions of open pores came the sunshine, and other feelings as well. In and out. She was porous.

Because she was raw and uncertain, and she liked to keep all the messy parts of herself to herself. ... As much as Lena liked to hide the mess and display the finished product, by this point she was all mess and no product.

Looking back, it was the thing in his life that shamed him the most: the times he was purposefully, calculatingly mean to Alice. It was those moments, and there had been many of them, that indicated to him that he was not a good person. He got mad at her for many things, but it was always really for the same thing: that she possessed his love and he couldn't seem to get it back. She didn't deserve it, which was to say she deserved better

Lena knew she had spent too much of her life in a state of passive dread, just waiting for something bad to happen. In a life like that, relief was as close as you got to happiness.

But then she hadn’t just learned to love this summer – she had also learned how to need.