You spend so much time, so much effort, trying to hold yourself together. And then everything falls apart anyway.

Just because a person is beautiful doesn't mean there's no soul beneath. Doesn't mean that person hasn't suffered like everyone else, doesn't mean they don't hope to still be a good human being in an awful world.

New Yorkers love the bigness -- the skyscrapers, the freedom, the lights. But they also love it when they can carve out some smallness for themselves. When the guy at the corner store knows which newspaper you want. When the barista has your order ready before you open your mouth. When you start to recognize the people in your orbit, and you know that, say, if you're waiting for the subway at eight fifteen on the dot, odds are the redhead with the red umbrella is going to be there too.

I text tiny a minute later. MADE NEW GAY FRIEND. And he texts back PROGRESS!!!

Love is so painful, how could you ever wish it on anybody? And love is so essential, how could you ever stand in its way?

When someone breaks up with you, their beauty-- which you took such satisfaction in-- suddenly becomes unfair.

I saw his scars - the visible ones-and saw how breaking him had not made him any less beautiful. If anything, he stood stronger, because he'd survived.