Just... isn't giving up allowed sometimes? Isn't it okay to say, ‘This really hurts, so I’m going to stop trying’?”
“It sets a dangerous precedent.”
“For avoiding pain?”
“For avoiding life.

I want to be near the ocean, Lincoln, the ocean! I want to feel the tides. And i want mountains, too, at least one mountain. Is that too much to ask? And trees. Not a whole forest, necessarily. I'd settle for a thicket. Scenery. I want scenery!

I like your glasses,” he said. “I like your Simon Snow T-shirts. I like that you don’t smile at everyone, because then, when you smile at me... Cather.

Smiling is confusing, she thought. This is why I don’t do it.

I don't feel like a trauma victim. I feel like a house after a fire. And sometimes I fell like someone who died but stayed in his body. And sometimes I feel like someone else died, like someone else sacrificed everything, so that I can have a normal life.
With wings.
And a tail.
And vampires.
And magicians.
And a boy in my arms, instead of a girl.
And a happy ending—even if it isn't the ending I ever would have dreamt for myself, or hoped for.
A chance.

October, baptize me with leaves! Swaddle me in corduroy and nurse me with split pea soup. October, tuck tiny candy bars in my pockets and carve my smile into a thousand pumpkins. O autumn! O teakettle! O grace!