Reading with an eye towards metaphor allows us to become the person we’re reading about, while reading about them. That’s why there is symbols in books and why your English teacher deserves your attention. Ultimately, it doesn’t matter if the author intended the symbol to be there because the job of reading is not to understand the author’s intent. The job of reading is to use stories as a way into seeing other people as a we ourselves.

It hurt, and that is not a euphemism. It hurt like a beating.

At some point we all look up and realize we are lost in a maze.

Idiotically, it occurred to me that my pink underwear didn’t match my purple bra, as if boys even notice such things.

The last time I was this scared, I peed myself." "The last time I was this scared," Radar says, "I actually had to face a Dark Lord in order to make the world safe for wizards.

I liked being a person. I wanted to keep at it.

The things I would do to that boy. I mean, not now that I know you're interested in him. But, oh, sweet holy Lord, I would ride that one-legged pony all the way around the corral." "Kaitlyn," I said. "Sorry. Do you think you'd have to be on top?" "Kaitlyn," I said.