You get older and you learn there is one sentence just four worlds long and if you can say it to yourself it offers more comfort than almost any other. It goes like this… Ready ” “Ready.” “At least I tried.

What made you feel that stomach-churning agony for one person and not another? If Bridget were God, she would have made it against the law for you to feel that way about someone without them having to feel it for you right back.

Please believe him. Keep your heart open to him. He can make you happy. He has always loved you, and you once loved him with all your heart.

Polly was pretty good at dieting, all right, but she was beginning to wonder whether you ever lost the parts of your self that you wanted to lose.

For some reason our lives were marked by summers. . . . Summer was the time when our lives joined completely, when we all had our birthdays, when really important things happened

Pain is fear, and I'm not afraid.

Bridget cried for the leavers and the left. For the people, like herself, grimly forsaking what precious gifts they would ever get.