71 quotes found
“I told myself that if I didn't care, this wouldn't have hurt so much - surely that proved I was alive and human and all those touchy-feely things, for once and for all. But that wasn't a relief, no...”
“Sometimes I think there's a beast that lives inside me, in the cavern that's where my heart should be, and every now and then it fills every last inch of my skin, so that I can't help but do someth...”
“What was wrong with me? I had a decent life. I was healthy. I wasn't starving or maimed by a land mine or orphaned. Yet somehow, it wasn't enough. I had a hole in me, and everything I took for gran...”
“The cost of growth is always a small act of violence.”
“When it comes to memories, the good and the bad never balance.”
“What you didn't tell someone was just as debilitating as what you did.”
“I don't know whether you can look at your past and find, woven like the hidden symbols on a treasure map, the path that will point to your final destination.”
“I don't understand why it's a sin if you love something and want to keep it from having to suffer.”
“There were lies we told to save ourselves, and then there were lies we told to rescue others. What counted more, the mistruth, or the greater good?”
“You can tell yourself that you would be willing to lose everything you have in order to get something you want. But its a catch-22: all of those things that youre willing to lose are what make you ...”
“I learned a long time ago with you that folks who were trying to be kind would rather do it with a macaroni-and-cheese bake than any personal involvement. You hand off a serving dish and you've don...”
“Choices are funny things-ask a native tribe that's eaten grubs and roots forever if they're unhappy, and they'll shrug. But give them filet mignon and truffle sauce and then ask them to go back to ...”
“I could not remember my first kiss, but I could have told you Charlotte would be my last.”
“I felt a splinter of guilt wedge into my heart. Charlotte had hurt me; in return, I'd hurt Rob. Maybe that's what we do to the people we love: take shots in the dark and realize too late we've woun...”
“You know how sometimes, your life is so perfect youre afraid for the next moment, because it couldnt possibly be quite as good? Thats what it felt like.”
“Maybe a mother wasn't what she seemed to be on the surface.”
“Parents aren't the people you come from. They're the people you want to be, when you grow up.”
“Annie turned away, her eyes glittering. 'Here's what no one tells you,' she said. 'When you deliver a fetus, you get a death certificate, but not a birth certificate. And afterward, your milk comes...”
“There are legions of us, I realized. The mothers who have broken babies, and spend the rest of our lives wondering if we should have spared them. And the mothers who have let their broken babies go...”
“Here's what I hadn't realized: the mother you haven't seen for almost thirty-six years isn't your mother, she's a stranger. Sharing DNA doesn't make you fast friends. This wasn't a joyous reunion. ...”
