More on this book
Community
Kindle Notes & Highlights
I couldn’t wish my mom back. I have a single memory of her and a handful of pictures. I know that I have only one life, and I need to live for what I love.
Donnelly tightens his loose cartilage earring. “Grandma Calloway sounds like a b…” His voice trails at Akara and Thatcher’s reprimanding looks. “…itch. Bitch. I meant bitch.” 15k. “Paul,” Thatcher snaps. Donnelly lets it go without care.
And he said, “Before I had you and your siblings, your mom was the one good thing in my life. And I know I’m supposed to tell you how love conquers all. How we could move mountains together. But the love we had almost destroyed us both. Love is like having a mortal wound and you’re bleeding out and no matter how hard you look, you can never find the goddamn cut.” He never broke eye contact.
My mortality, my fragile life, just crashed against me, and I remember that I’m only twenty-two. I remember that I can’t control the direction of anything, and I’m a passenger to the universe—but God, this ride can’t end for me. Not here, not now.
Farrow raises the book somewhat, just to read, “‘However short your life may be, it will still be long enough to live honestly and decently.’” He looks at me. “Sounds like you.”
“Moffy, please tell me how you are,” she whispers and when I don’t answer right away, she adds, “I hate that I’m not there yet.”
Tears scald our eyes, and we breathe and breathe, and I whisper, “You know, my heart is in your hand.”
“Cicero said, ‘The life of the dead is placed on the memories of the living. The love you gave in life keeps people alive beyond their time.’”
“I’m alright,” I say. “You need anything?” Farrow smiles at me like I stole his line, but he rubs his bottom lip with his thumb and tells me, “For right now, I’m good. No one’s crying, no one’s dying.”
But I’m more assured than ever that Janie wouldn’t be able to fill Farrow’s spot in my life. Just like he can’t replace hers. I need them both. I want them both.
In the quiet but crowded attic, I tell my best friend, “Je suis vivant, ma moitié.” I’m alive, my other half. She smiles into a sip of beer. “Je ne voudrais pas de toi d’une autre manière.” I wouldn’t want you any other way.
She unzips her purse and procures her pepper spray canister while marching to the door, guarded by Thatcher. Jane reaches him and lifts her chin since he’s a whole foot taller. “Excuse me, Thatcher, but there are people I need to have words with on my best friend’s behalf. Move aside.” Yeah, alright, I’m smiling.
Something inside of me has changed.
“You know, the hardest things are usually the right things.” I nod a couple times, my thumb stroking his cheek. “A philosopher talking to you again?” Maximoff starts to smile, and it’s drop-dead gorgeous. “If you want to call my dad and uncle philosophers, then yeah. A couple philosopher kings told me that.”
“Let me guess,” I say, walking backwards to the open barstool opposite Oscar, “my senior photo is floating around the internet.” I had green hair in that picture. “All over,” Akara nods. Predictable.
We are a publicist’s worst nightmare. Setting fire to our public images out of stubborn love.
But I’m distracted. By you-know-who. Not Voldemort. Someone hotter. Not that I think the villain in the Harry Potter books is even remotely hot—Christ, stop thinking.
Jane pries a piece of frizzy hair off her pink lips and only looks at me. “I have no use for condoms when there’s no dick in the world, small, regular or large, that I’d trust to enter my vagina.”
I’m not sharing in Jane’s Quest for Passion because she’ll be so determined to find mine, she’ll forget her search. I see that in how excited she is for me—I can’t do that to her.
