It's so, so stupid what we do to ourselves because we're afraid. It's so stupid.

But the bottom line is that, as humans, we are by nature selfish creatures. The only way we care about anything, really, is by making it about us.

As far as I was concerned, we'd come to a draw: I hadn't wanted to come, and she didn't want me to leave. We were even. But I knew my mother wouldn't see it that way. Lately, we didn't seem to see anything the same.

There was something so heavy about the burden of history, of the past. I wasn't sure I had it in me to keep looking back.

When you've never gotten love from someone, you don't know what it might look like if it ever does appear. You look for it in everything: any bright light overhead could be a star.

It’s funny how one summer can change everything.

Because now, I didn't care what they thought. It wasn't new, this realization that I would never be like them. What was different now was that I was glad. Macy page 199