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In her experience, most endings turned out to be beginnings in disguise.
What use was a cancer nurse with a fear of death?
“Can’t you see the poor girl’s not well? God, I should have done the world a favor and left you to choke the other day.”
“Well, there are winners and losers in life, and in this instance, you’re the loser,” said Magic Handbag Lady,
“I hate my job,” he said. “Not just a little bit. I really, really hate it.” He watched her face soften just slightly into a semblance of a smile.
Without the ridiculously high salary and bonuses he’d become accustomed to, he’d never be able to cover the monthly payments on the Porsche.
he often did, because he found the words hypnotically soothing and distracting, he recited the elements of the periodic table in his head, in order of atomic number: Hydrogen, helium, lithium, beryllium, boron, carbon, nitrogen . . . By the time he reached number thirty-seven on the third round—the often overlooked, but actually quite interesting, rubidium—his thoughts had stilled, his breathing calmed, and his heart stopped pounding.
Let’s smash through those nutritional guidelines and redefine the breakfast paradigm.
Where did all the middle-aged advertising people go?
“You’ve got to be kidding, Joey,” said Emmie. “You want us to create a campaign based on making women who already feel terrible about themselves for no reason feel even worse?”
“Parental controls?” said Emmie, looking at her as if she were a little dim. “Every boy learns to navigate their way around those by the time they’re about ten. And they all watch porn.
the only thing more alluring than a nude pic was a banned nude pic.
It was extracted under torture conditions and therefore exempted by the Geneva Conventions.
Iona laughed so hard at her own joke that it completely negated the need for anyone else to join in, thank goodness.
He knew that under all that fake porcelain, her actual teeth had been filed into tiny sharp daggers. There was a metaphor there somewhere.
He’d noticed that whereas people used to avoid sitting near Iona, now the seats in her vicinity were rarely vacant.
“Mmm. Well, I’m sure something will turn up,” said Iona. “In my experience, something usually does.”
“I’m not sure even the Minotaur would have the nerve to take on Iona,” said Sanjay. “Before
Sometimes fate just shows you the way to go and you have no option but to follow.
“Just don’t call her an agony aunt. Or let her organize a date for you.”
“Darling, what is the point of being alive if you go through life unnoticed, without standing out and making waves?
!!!!!!!!!!
Nobody had ever loved her with the intensity that he did, and this moment proved it.
“Are you avoiding going home, Piers?” Sanjay said. He meant it as a joke, but Piers’s reaction made him wonder whether he’d accidentally hit on a truth.
“The trick with equations,” said Piers, “is to stop thinking of them as boring old numbers and see them as patterns. Art, even. They really are quite beautiful. I’ll show you.”
“Jake,” he replied, holding out his hand. “Also known as Jake.”
He remembered how desperately he’d wanted to live, but now he couldn’t understand why.
“No!” said a voice right behind him.
It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy, Iona had said, look like a victim, become a target.
Martha tried to imagine Iona ever becoming a target and failed. That woman was bulletproof.
“Because she’s elegant but fierce. You know, Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee.”
“I’ve been carrying this around for you,” he said, handing her a laminated card. “It’s a VIP pass for my gym. If you can’t beat the bullies with this whole Romeo and Juliet thing, at least learn how to punch.”
Sanjay paused in the strip-lit, echoing stairwell, clinging to the wall and trying to catch his breath. His heart was thumping, faster and faster, and his palms were prickling with sweat. It was happening again.
Iona would know what to do.
The party that had turned out to be entirely a figment of her imagination.
Iona remembered the column she’d written, back on the day of the grape, about every ending being a beginning in disguise.
“I’m sure she would have told us if she were going away,” Sanjay said. “She’s not exactly one for keeping secrets, is she?”
They all looked horrified at the idea of asking Iona her age.
Calling you a c-word would do a grave disservice to c-words. You are a DICK.
If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?
But how could she fight now? What enemy was she even fighting?
And you’re the kind of person they warn us not to get into a car with, even if offered sweets.”
She’d always believed that adults knew all the answers, and that only she was trying to navigate through life without the requisite instruction manual.
“It’s not Iona you need to worry about,” said the manager. “She’s indestructible. It’s Bea.”
“You’re right. You can’t be separated from your daemon,” said Martha.
“I learned to break into houses when I was younger than you. Although I promise I didn’t steal anything except for food.
“We do. We’re all in a complete mess, of one sort or another,” said Martha. “Especially the grown-ups.”
“I can’t let them know how badly I’m struggling,” said Sanjay,
She looked at the caption underneath. This is who I want to be when I grow up, it said.
If you’re going to get it wrong, Martha, make sure you get it wrong with PANACHE!
But Iona tells me that it’s not exactly healthy to run away from your past, however unpleasant it was.
