I felt like an undeveloped photograph that he was printing, my image rising to the surface under his gaze.

If this was a sandalwood pyre she would have thrown herself in and this paper she'd become would have caught fire and she and him could sail away like two birds.

this was the wonderful thing about strangers. they were big blank pieces of paper, you could draw watever you like on their impresionable surfaces

What was the point in such loneliness among people. At least if you were by yourself, you had a good reason to be lonely.

When I read, I want to be fully transported to another place. I want to feel things, smell things.

We strive for beauty and balance, the sensual over the sentimental.

...The men eyed her with the automatic mix of curiosity, lust, and aesthetic judgment they always gave young women, subject to object, the way you'd stare at an animal. She pretended not to notice. To remind them she was a person was too much effort. Objects bore no guilt.