Sometimes you want to hear your own mother's voice.

Don't ask me how I am,' I blurt. 'Please.' I want to keep feeling good. Just because the lights are on doesn't mean I have to look.

Can it really be love if we don't talk that much, don't see each other? Isn't love something that happens between people who spend time together and know each other's faults and take care of each other?...In the end, I decide that the mark we've left on each other is the color and shape of love.

Ethan and I are done," I said finally. "I'm sorry." "He was my first boyfriend." "I know." "The only real boyfriend I've had. I'm a senior in high school and he was my only real boyfriend." "I know." "And I won't find another one at Jones Hall. That is guaranteed." "Okay." "This is all very sad and tragic," I said. Alan unwrapped a sleeve of Smarties. "Yet, oddly, you don't seem that upset." "I know.

I didn't 'decide' to write YA, per se. But every time I thought of a story, it featured characters 15, 16, 17.

I never had a connection like that to anyone, where every day you think about what you’ll tell them and you wonder what they’re doing, and you know they’re wondering what you’re doing.

I looked at my hand resting on the shelf of the prop cabinet, thinking of the scars that were there whether anyone could see them or not.