I think I have something that belongs to you’. I held out my open hand, the stone resting in my palm. I expected her to take it. Instead she took the whole hand, and held...

It can’t kill your soul. Words can kill your soul.

There is no wrong way to perform an act of kindness.

[Rayleen talking to Billy.] “Grace is thriving here, and I dare anybody to challenge that. Anybody who has a problem with that can come take it up with me.””Thank God,” Billy said, “because I really...

… even though it was beautiful and comfortable, and even though it was the world, it was also a little bit boring. No, wait. Maybe boring isn’t the right word. What’s the word I’m wanting...

Ah, yes. That. The sin of being happy or excited. According to my father, we must guard carefully against such things. According to my father, these emotions are the equivalent of dancing on out fifth-floor...

And then, every time I didn’t see her, there was a fall involved. I thought about dancing on the fifth-floor ledge outside out apartment. Every train she wasn’t on felt something like hitting the pavement...

I felt the kiss still there on my forehead. Literally. It was frozen there. I could still feel it. I wanted to bronze it, like people do with baby shoes. I wanted to mount it...

[There] was a time when a lot of people came to the door. The milkman. The iceman. The Fuller Brush man. Encyclopedia salesmen. There was a sense of interaction with the world that started right...

I decided that not talking is like a litmus test for a real friend. You can just sit there and be. Not always be filling up the air with words

Since we all know for a fact that we’re all going to die, why don’t we all treat each other like we could lose each other at any minute?

If you want to see a man come to his senses, try something like, Do you happen to carry a rubber in your wallet? Did I mention I’m not on the pill?

[Grace talking to Billy.] “It’s like people who want to feel only happy but not sad,” she said. “It never works. You either feel things or you don’t. You don’t get to pick and choose....