More on this book
Community
Kindle Notes & Highlights
That seems the likely ending to this love story: me dropping everything and doing anything, devoted as a dog, as he takes and takes and takes.
Mom says dwelling in your feelings is no way to live, that there will always be something to be upset about and the secret to a happy life is not to let yourself be dragged down into negativity.
the world is made of endlessly intersecting stories, each one valid and true.”
his contact still labeled DON’T DO IT from our last breakup.
“People will risk everything for a little bit of something beautiful,”
I wonder if he really believes that. He touched me first, said he wanted to kiss me, told me he loved me. Every first step was taken by him. I don’t feel forced, and I know I have the power to say no, but that isn’t the same as being in charge. But maybe he has to believe that. Maybe there’s a whole list of things he has to believe.
know I’m being surveilled, but it also feels like being pursued, oppressive and flattering all at once.
I try to imagine myself having that power, holding his heart, mine to abuse, but even when I picture it pulsing and pumping in my hands, it’s still the boss of me, leading me around, jerking me this way and that with me clinging and unable to let go.
Your life is like a movie. She didn’t understand the horror of watching your body star in something your mind didn’t agree
Somehow I sensed what was coming for me even then. Really, though, what girl doesn’t? It looms over you, that threat of violence. They drill the danger into your head until it starts to feel inevitable. You grow up wondering when it’s finally going to happen.
“You can’t do that,” she says. “You don’t get to change the facts to suit the story you want to tell.”
She’s right; I did lie. I sat there and let her believe what she wanted and felt no remorse. It didn’t even really feel like lying, more like shaping the truth to fit what she needed to hear, an act of contortion
With the sun on my face and a dog at my side, I have so much capacity for good.
