But, you see, that's the luxury of being a lout - you get to be selective about when you care and when you don't. The rest of us get stuck when your care goes shallow.

I could become a nun even if I am a non-believer. I'll learn to fake it like Nick did with me. I will minister the gospel of compassion and kindness and please, always use a condom, from famine-stricken nations to war-torn dead zones. It's possible I might become a nun who kisses other nuns.

The best is when we all go at once, like an army of interrelated popcorn zombies who laugh the same laughs and gasp the same gasps and aren’t so germ-phobic with each other that we won’t share a ginormous Coke with one straw. Family is useful like that.

I feel like there's so much darkness in all of my books.

[S]he leans into this guy and rocks her head like I’m making this music for her, when if I could, I would take it all away and give her as much silence as she’s given me pain.

But I know the difference. Everyone else is a ghost. I exist here alone, stranded by choice. Deserted.

One of the failures of cellular communication is that tiredness often comes across as sadness.