01UndatedThe truth doesn't get you very far on the streets, or in a group home, or even in high school. That's probably why the idea of Liars, Inc. appealed to me. Everybody lies. You might as well get paid for it.Paula Stokes / quote ↗
02UndatedMaybe I could dole out the truth in tiny pieces that, once assembled, would make a picture that resembled a reality in which I hadn’t done anything wrong.Paula Stokes / quote ↗
04UndatedI laugh as an unfamiliar feeling envelops me. I think it might be happiness.Paula Stokes / quote ↗
05UndatedI get it. Traveling halfway across the world to run into the boy you grew up with, getting back together after years apart—that’s an epic fucking fairytale. I don’t blame you for being seduced by it. I guess I just thought what we had was better. You know, because it was real.Paula Stokes / quote ↗
07UndatedWe’re like magnets, you know. Only I’m spinning, so I keep pulling you in and then pushing you away. I like you, but then you hurt me, so I run. I like you, but then something makes things feel impossible, so I turn away. And you. You’re so constant. Your orientation never wavers. You feel what you feel and you want what you want without hesitation or doubt. God, I envy that. I feel like if someone stripped away my hesitation and doubt that there’d be nothing left.Paula Stokes / quote ↗
08UndatedI think about the way Baz teased me earlier, how he wanted to know what it felt like to have someone who would do anything for me. Maybe it sounds comforting to know there is a person out there who would risk his life to protect you—a person who would back off when you asked and then come to you when you changed your mind. Especially when that person is as kind and decent as Jesse. The truth is, it’s terrifying. It’s just one more opportunity for me to be a monster.Paula Stokes / quote ↗
09UndatedI go back for seconds and thirds and fourths and fifths, when it’s good. Just not if it means some guy gets to put a leash on me.Paula Stokes / quote ↗
11UndatedJesse stirs again. This time his fingers twitch. As much as I want to see him open his eyes, I can’t be here for that. It’ll make leaving him too hard. I turn toward the doorway and I’m outside in the main room of the ICU when I hear his weakened voice say, “Winter?”I hurry back to the waiting area. Hopefully he’ll think he dreamed me. Maybe he did. Sometimes I feel like I’m not even real anymorePaula Stokes / quote ↗
12UndatedRose lived the same life I did, but she doesn’t have PTSD. No bad dreams, no missing memories. Sometimes I’m jealous that she seems to deal with everything better than I do. But then I’ll catch her with this hollow look in her eyes and think maybe she just disguises everything for my benefit.Maybe she’s broken on the inside too.Paula Stokes / quote ↗
14UndatedI remember a time when all I wanted was a gun and to learn how to use it. I thought a gun would make me feel safe. I thought a gun would make me feel powerful. But right now I just feel . . . heavy. Like I live in this world of death and destruction and I’ll never escape alive.Paula Stokes / quote ↗
15UndatedThe world is full of holes and uneven seams, wrinkled places that you can’t make smooth, no matter how hard you try.Paula Stokes / quote ↗
16UndatedSome people think they can just decree that everything will be fine. The world doesn’t work like that. I’m not sure the world gives a crap about anyone’s promises, well-meaning or otherwise. Sometimes the Universe just takes what it wants.Paula Stokes / quote ↗
17UndatedEmotions I’ve been working hard to hold back all summer start to spill out of me as I pull Elliott’s mouth toward my own. I’m so eager and impatient that our noses bump and teeth knock together before our lips slide into place. The frigid water is still lapping at my legs, but I can’t feel it anymore. My entire body is flush with heat, with desire. If it weren’t for the faintest hint of dance music from the clearing, I’d think that the two of us were completely alone.I wish the two of us were completely alone.Paula Stokes / quote ↗
18UndatedTo us, reality is just raw footage: Unclear. Desultory. Too shocking or not quite shocking enough. It’s ironic that making something more real involves making it less real, but Gideon always says people don’t want real. They want the idea of real, which involves production.Paula Stokes / quote ↗
19UndatedWhoever said it was better to have loved and lost was completely full of shit.Paula Stokes / quote ↗
20UndatedTime doesn’t heal anything. It’s like drinking. The best it can do is help you forget, if you’re lucky.Paula Stokes / quote ↗
21UndatedI remember the big gaping hole left by my dad’s absence in the months following the accident. He’d been the one who went to my parent-teacher conferences, the one who taught me mnemonics to memorize the Great Lakes and the Earth’s atmospheres. Whenever I did something silly, my dad always made me feel better by telling me a story from the firehouse about someone who had done something even sillier. Sometimes you don’t realize all the things a person does for you until they aren’t there to do them anymore.Paula Stokes / quote ↗
22UndatedSobs force their way out of my throat. I feel like I’m trapped in a disaster movie where everything is shriveling into darkness and ash. Sunflowers are being uprooted. Puppies are being trampled. Whole cities are crumbling to dust.Paula Stokes / quote ↗
23UndatedHow do you make me smile when it seems like there’s nothing in the whole world to smile about?Paula Stokes / quote ↗
