01c. 1971 ADThe books I read when I was twenty completely changed when I read them when I was sixty.Sarah Addison Allen / quote ↗
02c. 1971 ADHe didn't think he belonged here, so she was making him face some uncomfortable facts. People adapt. People change. You can grow where you're planted.Sarah Addison Allen / quote ↗
03c. 1971 ADUnder her thick pancake makeup, her skin had been pockmarked, but he would stare at her adoringly from his cot at night and imagine her scars were constellations, a secret map to a far-off, happy place.Sarah Addison Allen / quote ↗
04c. 1971 ADUnder her thick pancake makeup, her sin had been pockmarked, but he would stare at her adoringly from his cot at night and imagine her scars were constellations, a secret map to a far-off, happy place.Sarah Addison Allen / quote ↗
05c. 1971 ADTo this day she could make tap water boil just by kissing him.Sarah Addison Allen / quote ↗
06c. 1971 ADYellow joy was radiating from her. When you're happy for yourself, it fills you. When you're happy for someone else, it pours over. It was almost too bright to watch.Sarah Addison Allen / quote ↗
07c. 1971 ADYou can't change where you come from, but you can change where you go from here. Just like a book. If you don't like the ending, you can make up a new one.Sarah Addison Allen / quote ↗
08c. 1971 ADThe word lethologica describes the state of not being able to remember the word you want.Sarah Addison Allen / quote ↗
09c. 1971 ADLove always hurts. That’s one thing I know you know. But it’s worth it. That’s what you don’t know. Yet.Sarah Addison Allen / quote ↗
10c. 1971 ADIt was a remarkable realization to Eby, that we are what we're taught. That was why the Morris women were what they were. It was because they knew no different.Sarah Addison Allen / quote ↗
11c. 1971 ADHe stared up at the moon, which looked like a giant hole in the sky, letting light through to the other side.Sarah Addison Allen / quote ↗
12c. 1971 ADBut she stopped herself. That wouldn't make it right. You didn't forgive because it was the only choice you thought you had. That didn't make it forgiveness, that made it desperation. She'd always been too desperate about Jake. Always.Sarah Addison Allen / quote ↗
13c. 1971 ADEby knew all too well that there was a fine line when it came to grief. If you ignore it, it goes away, but then it always comes back when you least expect it. If you let it stay, if you make a place for it in your life, it gets too comfortable and it never leaves. It was best to treat grief like a guest. You acknowledge it, you cater to it, then you send it on its way.Sarah Addison Allen / quote ↗
14c. 1971 ADThe air around her was cool lately, as if she were creating a vacuum with her unhappiness.Sarah Addison Allen / quote ↗
15c. 1971 ADShe opened her eyes slowly and saw that a pale lavender moth had come to a rest on the back of her hand. She watched it from her pillow, wondering if it was real. It reminded her of her husband Matt's favorite T-shirt, which she'd hidden in a bag of sewing, unable to throw it away. It had a large faded moth on the front, the logo of a cover band out of Athens called the Mothballs.That T-shirt, that moth, always brought back a strange memory of when she was a child. She used to draw tattoos of butterflies on her arms with Magic Markers. She would give them names, talk to them, carefully fill in their colors when they started to fade. When the time came that they wanted to be set free, she would blow on them and they would come to life, peeling away from her skin and flying away.Sarah Addison Allen / quote ↗
16c. 1971 ADThere was an art to the male posterior. That's all there was to it.Sarah Addison Allen / quote ↗
17c. 1971 ADSnow flurries began to fall and they swirled around people's legs like house cats. It was magical, this snow globe world.Sarah Addison Allen / quote ↗
18c. 1971 ADLike magic, she felt him getting nearer, felt it like a pull in the pit of her stomach. It felt like hunger but deeper, heavier. Like the best kind of expectation. Ice cream expectation. Chocolate expectation.Sarah Addison Allen / quote ↗
19c. 1971 ADShe went to the window. A fine sheen of sugary frost covered everything in sight, and white smoke rose from chimneys in the valley below the resort town. The window opened to a rush of sharp early November air that would have the town in a flurry of activity, anticipating the tourists the colder weather always brought to the high mountains of North Carolina. She stuck her head out and took a deep breath. If she could eat the cold air, she would. She thought cold snaps were like cookies, like gingersnaps. In her mind they were made with white chocolate chunks and had a cool, brittle vanilla frosting. They melted like snow in her mouth, turning creamy and warm.Sarah Addison Allen / quote ↗
20c. 1971 ADSitting at the old patio table she’d cleared of leaves, she smiled and leaned back. The stars looked twisted in the limbs of the trees, like Christmas lights. She felt like part of the hollow around her was filling. She’d come here with too many expectations.Sarah Addison Allen / quote ↗
21c. 1971 ADBusiness was doing well, because all the locals knew that dishes made from the flowers that grew around the apple tree in the Waverley garden could affect the eater in curious ways. The biscuits with lilac jelly, the lavender tea cookies, and the tea cakes made with nasturtium mayonnaise the Ladies Aid ordered for their meetings once a month gave them the ability to keep secrets. The fried dandelion buds over marigold-petal rice, stuffed pumpkin blossoms, and rose-hip soup ensured that your company would notice only the beauty of your home and never the flaws. Anise hyssop honey butter on toast, angelica candy, and cupcakes with crystallized pansies made children thoughtful. Honeysuckle wine served on the Fourth of July gave you the ability to see in the dark. The nutty flavor of the dip made from hyacinth bulbs made you feel moody and think of the past, and the salads made with chicory and mint had you believing that something good was about to happen, whether it was true or not.Sarah Addison Allen / quote ↗
22c. 1971 ADHe stood there, glowing like the sun, and stared at her like she was the unbelievable one.Sarah Addison Allen / quote ↗
23c. 1971 ADYou can't change where you came from, but you can change where you go from here.Sarah Addison Allen / quote ↗
24c. 1971 ADFate never promises to tell you everything up front. You aren't always shown the path in life you're supposed to take. But sometimes when you're really lucky, you meet someone with a map.Sarah Addison Allen / quote ↗
