That was the thing about best friends. Like sisters and mothers, they could piss you off and make you cry and break your heart, but in the end, when the chips were down, they were there, making you laugh even in your darkest hours.

Girls like you can't understand," Julia said, and it was true. Ellie had been popular. She didn't know that some hurts were like a once-broken bone. In the right weather, they could ache for a lifetime.

From the first time we met, we knew everything that mattered about each other, didn't we? We just knew. I guess that's what best friends are: parts of each other.

...This fear was unbearable. It unwrapped who she was, as neatly as he'd unwound her bandage, leaving too much pain and ugliness exposed. Nerve endings; he'd said they were the problem [causing phantom pain in the amputated limb]." Things that cut off, that ended abruptly or died--like parents and marriages--kept hurting forever.

A daughter without her mother is a woman broken. It is a loss that turns to arthritis and settles deep into her bones.

To those who are here, those who are gone, and those who are lost.

What good did it do to light the world on fire if she had to watch the glow alone?