01UndatedBecause even if the lie is beautiful, the truth is what you face in the end.Lauren DeStefano / quote ↗
02UndatedA strange thing, words. Once they're said, it's hard to imagine they're untrue.Lauren DeStefano / quote ↗
04UndatedI wish I had a memory of that first violent shove, the shock of cold air, the sting of oxygen into new lungs. Everyone should remember being born. It doesn't seem fair that we only remember dying.Lauren DeStefano / quote ↗
05UndatedThe clouds took on the shape of dancers; from somewhere far off, Pram heard music before the clouds became normal again.Lauren DeStefano / quote ↗
06UndatedIt taught that there are three versions of things: the one I see in my mind, and the one that carries onto the paper, and then what it ultimately becomes.Lauren DeStefano / quote ↗
07UndatedFelix wasn't sure of his limits, if he had limits. After he'd been dead a while, he began to suspect he could swim to the bottom of the oceans. Beyond that. He suspected that he could swim so far down that he'd eventually go through the center of the earth and come out the other side. He could swim into the clouds, into the stars. Maybe there were ghosts on the other planets. Maybe there were ghosts laughing and splashing each other with the heat of the sun. He wasn't brave enough to find out.Lauren DeStefano / quote ↗
08UndatedFelix had left his heart buried in the ground years ago, but he felt it crack apart.Lauren DeStefano / quote ↗
09UndatedI have always been fascinated by the ocean, to dip a limb beneath its surface and know that I'm touching eternity, that it goes on forever until it begins here again.Lauren DeStefano / quote ↗
10UndatedJenna, standing in the doorway with her mouth and hand full of shelled pistachios, says, '"Real' is a dirty word in this place'.Lauren DeStefano / quote ↗
11UndatedJust being alive feels so arduous that all I want to do is climb under the covers and sleep.Lauren DeStefano / quote ↗
13UndatedShe's been conned, ruined, left for dead, and she's not going to forgive any of it. She will soldier on, if only out of spite.Lauren DeStefano / quote ↗
14UndatedI don't dare touch her. Loss is a knowledge I'm sorry to have. Perhaps the only thing worse than experiencing it, is watching it replay anew in someone else--all the awful stages picking up like a chorus that has to be sung.Lauren DeStefano / quote ↗
15UndatedHe was now working his way through the many shades of grief. Sadness made everything gray, he'd learned, but there were different types of gray, some darker than others. There were dark spots in his memories he wasn't brave enough to enter.Lauren DeStefano / quote ↗
16UndatedHe looks at me, and I don't know what he sees. I used to think it was Rose. But she's not here with us now, in this room. It's just him and me, and the books. I feel like our lives are in those books. I feel like all the words on the pages are for us.Lauren DeStefano / quote ↗
17UndatedIt's quiet for a while, and then Rowan says; "We could talk now. We're alone out here. No walls.""There are always walls." I say.Lauren DeStefano / quote ↗
18UndatedAnd so ends his rush from his greatest act of rebellion. He understands that no matter where he runs or how high he flies, he will always have to come home.Lauren DeStefano / quote ↗
21UndatedThis is the real Madame. I can see why she hides herself in accents and gems and exotic perfumes. I can see why she's grown to hate anything to do with love. She isn't evil or corrupt the way that Vaughn is. She's broken. Only broken.Lauren DeStefano / quote ↗
22UndatedI start trying to stay unconscious. The problem with this is that no amount of willpower can change the reality.Lauren DeStefano / quote ↗
23UndatedI think he's beginning to understand, and understanding is a horrible thing.Lauren DeStefano / quote ↗
