Levi was smiling. He kicked her chair again.

Maybe he was Filipino. Was that in Asia? Probably. Asia's out-of-control huge.

He knew why he wanted to kiss her. Because she was beautiful. And before that, because she was kind. And before that, because she was smart and funny. Because she was exactly the right kind of smart and funny. Because he could imagine taking a long trip with her without ever getting bored. Because whenever he saw something new and interesting, or new and ridiculous, he always wondered what she'd have to say about it--how many stars she'd give it and why.

it’s like swimming upstream. Or … falling down a cliff and grabbing at branches, trying to invent the branches as I fall.

Maybe Park had paralyzed her with his ninja magic, his Vulcan handhold, and now he was going to eat her. That would be awesome.

Bono met his wife in high school," Park says. "So did Jerry Lee Lewis," Eleanor answers. "I’m not kidding," he says. "You should be," she says, "we’re sixteen." "What about Romeo and Juliet?" "Shallow, confused," then dead. "I love you, Park says. "Wherefore art thou," Eleanor answers. "I’m not kidding," he says. "You should be.

I take something that happened to me in 1983, and I make it happen to somebody else in 1943. I pick my life apart that way, try to understand it better by writing straight through it.