My Friends

by Fredrik Backman

Fish was murdered by reality. She was suffocated by the claustrophobia of being trapped on this planet, she died of being sad all the time.

his anxiety made him feel like he was drowning. That he was so scared that if he held on to his friends’ hands, he would drag them down into the darkness with him.

our breath consists of eighty percent nitrogen, twenty percent oxygen, and one hundred percent anxiety.

“Don’t hurt yourself!” he makes her promise, and that’s the most loving thing any adult has ever said to her.

there’s never any wind or rain in nostalgia.

“Because loyalty is a superpower.”

I’m sorry that you talk about that like it was normal. I’m sorry you didn’t have a better childhood. It isn’t your fault.”

“I think you’re like the drawing, you’re not ready yet. But one day I think you’re going to do something important. One day you’ll paint someone else’s postcard.”

“It suits you, that laugh. I’m glad they didn’t manage to take it from you.” “Who?” “All the people who have tried.”

Ted and Ted’s brain are not friends, they’re classmates, forced to do a group assignment called “life” together. And it’s not going great.

“The birds are like tourists. They screech and make a mess, but you’re not allowed to shoot them…”

But Dad once told me, when he was really fucking drunk, that he and Mom weren’t like two magnets. They were like two colors. Once they were mixed together, there was no way of separating them.”

It’s a funny thing. The person we fall in love with, we hardly ever call by their name. Because it’s somehow just so obvious that it’s you I’m talking to, that it’s you I’m always thinking of. Who else?