The best relationships were the ones where both sides went out of their way to make sure the other wasn't disappointed.

Words, for all they were flimsy and invisible, had great strength. They could be fortified as a castle wall and sharp as a foil. They could bite, slap, shock, wound. But unlike deeds, words couldn't really help you. No promise ever rescued a person; it was the carrying-through of it that brought about salvation.

All writers start with a layer of truth, don't they? If not, their stories would be nothing but spools of cotton candy, a fleeting taste wrapped around nothing but air.

What you had could never make up for what you'd lost.

What could you give me," I ask, my voice shaking, "to make me forget ... that you forgot about me?

When you are a kid you have your own language, and unlike French or Spanish or whatever you start learning in fourth grade, this one you are born with, and eventually lose...Kids think with their brains cracked wide open; becoming an adult...is only a slow sewing it shut.

A heroin-thin boy with enough rings in his eyebrows to resemble a shower curtain rod.