I'd been blindsided with the most painful knowledge: the first man to ever say he loved me had never loved me at all. His passion had been artificial. His pursuit of me had been choreographed.

It’s called Two and a Half Men,” Dermot was telling his guest. “I understand,” Bellenos said. “Because the two brothers are grown, and the son isn’t.” “I think so,” Dermot said. “Don’t you think the son is useless?” “The half? Yes. At home, we’d eat him,” Bellenos said.

When you've been really beaten, you realize that you are just an envelope of skin, an easily penetrated envelope that holds together a lot of fluids and some rigid structures, which in their turn can simply be broken and invaded.

Oklahoma is very beautiful, and Eric loves beauty, but he already has that in you.

You just don't want a vampire pissed off at you.

My mother finally took me to a child psychologist, who knew exactly what I was, but she just couldn’t accept it and kept trying to tell my folks I was reading their body language and was very observant, so I had good reason to imagine I heard people’s thoughts. Of course, she couldn’t admit I was literally hearing people’s thoughts because that just didn’t fit into her world.

As exits go, that's a good one." It was pretty hard to have the last word with a vampire.