If you expect the worst, you'll never be disappointed.

I am not breaking my rules,' I snapped, hating that I'd ended up on the advice-recieving end of things, jumping from Dear Remy to Confused in Cincinnati all in one summer.

That was the thing about being on the inside: the world was just going on, even when it seemed like time for you had stopped for good.

I would have thought this would make me feel better.. getting to be the one to leave and not the one left behind. But it didn't. Not at all.

“Well," Isaid finally, knowing he was waiting, “you make me laugh.” He nodded. “And?” “You're pretty good-looking." ""Pretty good-looking? I called you beautiful." "You want to be beautiful?" I asked him. "Are you saying I'm not?"

You can't just plan a moment when things get back on track, just as you can't plan the moment you lose your way in the first place. But standing there alone on the landing, I thought of Grandma Halley and how she'd held me close against her lap as we watched the sky together. I'd always thought I couldn't remember, but suddenly in that moment, I closed my eyes and saw the comet, finally, brilliant and impossible, stretching above me across the sky.

I waited. Because with Eli, he was never trying to get you to finish for him. He always knew where he was going, even if it took a little while to get there.