I feel a strange, fierce squeeze in my heart when I see him, like pride, although there's nothing about Sean that I can take credit for.

As you learn who you are, you can better surround yourself with friends who make you a better person, and that sometimes only happens when you disassemble old relationships.

He was a patient with a diagnosis that he couldn't understand.

It occurred to me that there was a story behind the scar -- maybe not as dramatic as the story of my wrists, but a story nonetheless -- and the fact that everyone had a story behind some mark on their inside or outside suddenly exhausted me, the gravity of all those untold pasts.

Happiness isn't something this island yields easily; the ground is too rocky and the sun too sparse for it to flourish.

His home was populated by things and creatures from Niall Lynch's dreams, and his mother was just another one of them

Mutual, respectful, enduring love is completely attainable as long as you swear you won't settle for less.