Sometimes writing is running downhill, your fingers jerking behind you on the keyboard the way your legs do when they can’t quite keep up with gravity.

Baz. "Have you ever done this before?" Simon. "Yes. No." "Yes or no?" "Yes. Not like this." Baz. "Not with a boy?" Simon. "Not when I really wanted it.

I know what it’s like to be distracted. To seek out distractions. To exhaust yourself doing every other little thing rather than face a blank page

He looked exactly like a rat. Like the human being version of a rat. Like the villain in a Don Bluth movie.

Cath couldn't stop thinking about Levi and his ten thousand smiles.

Ah." He set down his backpack and pulled out their notebook. "You're working on your final project?" "Indirectly," Cath said. "What does that mean?" "Have you ever heard sculptors say that they don't actually sculpt an object; they sculpt away everything that isn't the object?" "No." He sat down. "Well, I'm writing everything that isn't my final project, so that when I actually sit down to write it, that's all that will be left in my mind.

You're wearing at least four different kinds of sweater." "This is a scarf." "You look tarred and sweatered.