01UndatedIt wasn’t until I’d walked halfway across the parking lot that I realized: 1. I wasn’t wearing shoes. A. Or a shirt. 2. I didn’t bring my keys A. Or anything really. 3. I’d just left a complete stranger in my apartment. A. Naked.Whoever said one-night stands were supposed to be simple with no strings attached had clearly never met the disaster that was me.Cora Carmack / quote ↗
02UndatedGarrick was panting when he replied, “You’re not forcing me to do anything. I just want you to be sure. You can say stop at anytime.” His lips pulled wide. “You don’t need to make up a new pet.Cora Carmack / quote ↗
03UndatedNo tragedies here, Roar. This world will make you a victim every chance it gets. Don't let it.Cora Carmack / quote ↗
04UndatedThe best parts of life are the things we can't plan. And it's a lot harder to find happiness if you're only searching in one place. Sometimes, you just have to throw away the map. Admit that you don't know where you're going and stop pressuring yourself to figure it out. Besides...a map is a life someone else already lived. It's more fun to make your own.Cora Carmack / quote ↗
05UndatedBliss, I don’t normally do things like that. But I was second-guessing everything about coming here, and you were everything I needed. I don’t know how many times I’ve stopped myself from coming over here and knocking on your door. And yes, seeing you with Cade was definitely motivation, but more than that... I just like you, Bliss. As a teacher. As a person. As a guy.Cora Carmack / quote ↗
06UndatedWords streamed from my mouth, some familiar, some not.The last of the were, "I love you."He rose up off me with a grin. "If I'd known it was that easy to get you to admit how you feel, I would have done this a long time ago.Cora Carmack / quote ↗
07UndatedPhaedra keeps saying she's being selfish. That she hates herself for it, but she does it anyway. She can't deny herself what she wants, even if it brings about her downfall and his." "And have you learned anything from our literary parallel?" "Not really, I keep thinking that she would do it all over again if there were a chance...a chance that it could go right. Even if 99 times out of a 100 the story ends badly, it's worth it if only once she gets a happy ending.Cora Carmack / quote ↗
08UndatedHe wore his hope like a winter coat, layered over the top of all of him.Cora Carmack / quote ↗
10UndatedMy mother had told me once when I was little and had a friendship fall apart that some relationships just end. Like a star, they burn bright and brilliant, and then nothing in particular goes wrong, they just reach their end.Cora Carmack / quote ↗
11UndatedPain changes us. Mine made me want to be perfect, so that no one would ever want to leave me again.Cora Carmack / quote ↗
12UndatedThen, slowly, like the sunrise peeking over the horizon, she smiled.She snapped the box closed.She didn’t scream. She didn’t run. She didn’t faint.There might have been a little crying.But mostly… she danced.Cora Carmack / quote ↗
13UndatedShe said she wanted my best line tomorrow after the show, and now I knew what it was going to be.Cora Carmack / quote ↗
14UndatedSometimes she was Aurora. Confident. Clever. Cultured.Sometimes she was Rora. Afraid. Alone. Ashamed.And more and more, she was Roar -- bold, brash, and increasingly baffled by the situation in which she found herself. And sometimes she was none of them, lost and adrift somewhere in between, like the wildlands between Stormling cities.Cora Carmack / quote ↗
15UndatedBecause you've got balls of steel.'I hated when people said that, like it assumed strength and being a male were synonymous. There was strength in being a woman. 'Spence, I don't have balls. Good thing, too, because they'd look terrible in the lingerie I'm wearing.Cora Carmack / quote ↗
16UndatedThe future is never just one choice. It's a thousand. And they never stop. You will choose your future every day of your life. And should you wake up one day to find that you regret the choice you made the day before, then you make a new one. Don't worry about whether you might be wrong someday. Worry about whether you're right now. Tomorrow can wait.Cora Carmack / quote ↗
17UndatedBlind belief is a comfort; it is the frame that puts the rest of the world into context. It allows us to block out the things that don’t make sense, that which frightens us. It narrows our vision so that the world does not feel so large. Would it comfort you to have the frame of superstition? To believe that if you say the right words and sacrifice the right things, then your world will stay exactly as it is? Or do you wish to choose what you believe, what you trust and understand?Cora Carmack / quote ↗
18UndatedEach one you take is a commitment. If you break that commitment, the gods of alcohol will punish you with a hangover so bad you'll think Satan himself took a dump on you. -MiloCora Carmack / quote ↗
19UndatedIf brains could have orgasms, I'm pretty sure this was what it would feel like.Cora Carmack / quote ↗
22UndatedThe timbre of his voice went into that low register that made my insides curl in on themselves--it was like my uterus was tapping out a happy dance on the rest of my organs.Cora Carmack / quote ↗
23UndatedI will call bullshit on that so many times that the word bullshit will lose all meaning. -MiloCora Carmack / quote ↗
24UndatedBecause try as I might, perfect doesn't guarantee me anything. I can't control whether other people will want me or love me or even like me. I can only control how I feel about myself.Cora Carmack / quote ↗
