He will be someone who is defined, first and always, by what he is missing.

He experienced the singular pleasure of watching people he loved fall in love with other people he loved.

What he knew, he knew from books, and books lied, they made things prettier.

. . . breathing slowly and rubbing his palm against his chest as if to soothe his heart.

There was something scary and anxiety-inducing about being in a space where nothing seemed to be forbidden to him, where everything was offered to him and nothing was asked in return

This isn't fair, he would think in those moments. This isn't friendship. It's something, but it's not friendship. He felt he had been hustled into a game of complicity, one he never intended to play.

And so I try to be kind to everything I see, and in everything I see, I see him.

My phone rang, and although it wasn't a sinister time of night, and although nothing had happened that I would later see as foreshadowing, I knew, I knew.

It's a good story, ' he said. He even grinned at me. 'I'll tell you.''Please, ' I said.And then he did.

He had never done it before, and so he had no real understanding of how slow, and sad, and difficult it was to end a friendship.

Thank god he wasn't a writer, or he'd have nothing to write about.

He loved Shevek, but he could not show him what freedom is, that recognition of each person's solitude which alone transcends it.

Even more blood welled up and spilled down his arm, splattering onto the ground.“Camille’s carpet, ” Magnus protested.“It’s blood, ” said Will. “She ought to be thrilled.

I've never looked forward to a birthday like I'm looking forward to my new daughter's birthday, because two days after that is when I can apply for reinstatement.

When a man opens a car door for his wife, it's either a new car or a new wife.

Self-made men often worship their creator.

Inner seeing has nothing to do with physical vision; it's the perception of life directly.

Today the brightest light in the Scottish political firmament has gone out.

My own idea of a $5,500 .45 auto is a used Volkswagon with a Glock 30 in the glove box.

You can't patch a wounded soul with a Band-Aid.

In art there is no progress, only fluctuations of intensity.