Rachel > Rachel's Quotes

“Maybe this is what we speak of when we talk about nostalgia. A longing not for a thing or a place but for a version of ourselves that is now gone, something that slipped through our fingers, piece by piece, day after day after day, without our realizing it.”
― Geraldine DeRuiter, If You Can't Take the Heat: Tales of Food, Feminism, and Fury

“I couldn’t remember the last time someone had kissed me that passionately—savored me, like I was the last sentence in his favorite book.”
― Ashley Poston, A Novel Love Story

“There was no falling-out, no great tragedy, just a hundred thousand trivial moments they didn’t share, each one an inch of distance between them, and eventually those inches added up to miles.”
― Grady Hendrix, My Best Friend's Exorcism

“He makes me feel like I'm the only person on the planet. He looks at me like he's one second away from devouring me. No wonder I proposed.”
― Christina Lauren, Sweet Filthy Boy

“When I was young, I felt the physical weight of race constantly. We had less. Our lives were more violent. And whether by genes, culture, or divine judgment, this was said to be our fault. The only tool to escape this damnation—for a lucky few—was school. Later I went out into the world and saw the other side, those who allegedly, by genes, culture, or divine judgment, had more but—as I came to understand—knew less. These people, white people, were living under a lie. More, they were, in some profound way, suffering for the lie. They had seen more of the world than I had—but not more of humanity itself. Most stunningly, I realized that they were deeply ignorant of their own country’s history, and thus they had no intimate sense of how far their country could fall. A system of supremacy justifies itself through illusion, so that those moments when the illusion can no longer hold always come as a great shock.”
― Ta-Nehisi Coates, The Message

“These people, white people, were living under a lie. More, they were, in some profound way, suffering for the lie. They had seen more of the world than I had—but not more of humanity itself. Most stunningly, I realized that they were deeply ignorant of their own country’s history, and thus they had no intimate sense of how far their country could fall. A system of supremacy justifies itself through illusion, so that those moments when the illusion can no longer hold always come as a great shock. The Trump years amazed a certain kind of white person; they had no reference for national vulgarity, for such broad corruption and venality, until it was too late. The least reflective of them say, “This is not America.” But some of them suspect that it is America, and there is great pain in understanding that, without your consent, you are complicit in a great crime, in learning that the whole game was rigged in your favor, that there are nations within your nation who have spent all of their collective lives in the Trump years. The pain is in the discovery of your own illegitimacy—that whiteness is power and nothing else.”
― Ta-Nehisi Coates, The Message

“I want to be loved, Beth says without hesitation. I want to feel more than bland fondness for the man who'll be in my bed and own me.”
― Emma R. Alban, Don't Want You Like a Best Friend

“The need to call this thing “good” and this thing “bad,” this thing “white” and this thing “black,” was an impulse that Effia did not understand. In her village, everything was everything. Everything bore the weight of everything else.”
― Yaa Gyasi, Homegoing

“I decided that for me, Akosua, I will be my own nation."
As James listened to her speak, he felt something well up inside him as it had never done before. If he could, he would listen to her speak forever. If he could, he would join that nation she spoke of.”
― Yaa Gyasi, Homegoing

“If you don’t think that I’m very aware of your presence, always, you have no idea what’s going on.”
― Ali Hazelwood, Deep End

“These old things, they don’t look like much, but they bookmark our lives. They have a silent permanence that people and places do not. Something to carry with us. Always. They were there when no one else was, looking on without judgment when all of these wonderful and terrible things happened to us. And still, they are there. They survive. And somehow, they remember. The worry is, if they’re gone, we are gone, too.”
― Marisha Pessl, Darkly

“When they were together, his need for her had been so powerful that it was almost like a living thing. But there was an ugly side to it, a side that overwhelmed her, smothered her, left her helpless and flailing in his absence. But she'd learned to live without him again. She didn't need him anymore. And tonight, there was no familiar edge of wild-eyed desperation to his plea. He didn't need her anymore, either. But they still wanted each other. They would still choose each other over anyone else on earth. And in a way, that was even better.”
― Ava Wilder, How to Fake It in Hollywood

“The point isn't the sex, or the fantasy of the perfect partner, or even falling in love. It's about being willing to be vulnerable, to dig deep, to confront your shadows, embrace your own story, and become a stronger, braver version of yourself. It's not about the happy ending—it's about believing that you're worthy of one.”
― Ali Brady, Battle of the Bookstores

“Maybe he's right. Maybe all stories are love stories at their core. The search for belonging, the ache of grief, our fumbling attempt to find purpose and connection in this big, confusing world.”
― Ali Brady, Battle of the Bookstores

“I guess any place can be okay if you choose to enjoy it.”
― Brenna Thummler, Sheets

“It’s been years now. I have been asking him to haunt me.”
― Courtney Gustafson, Poets Square: A Memoir in Thirty Cats

“I don't want magic to make my wish come true. I want to do it myself.”
― Jenny L. Howe, Love at Full Tilt

“This, of course, was the moment that sticks with me forever, the axis on which so many other moving parts of my life would turn. Every decision we make ends up cascading into others, affecting our lives in ways we can't possibly comprehend. Most of these events seem inconsequential at the time, infinite grains of sand under our feet as we walk on by. Others, however, are huge boulders dividing our journey in two undeniable paths.”
― Chuck Tingle, Bury Your Gays

“Have you always been like this?" she asked.
Always like what? If she meant the way he'd been back in her room, the way he'd told her want to do, how to touch herself, then the answer was no. He'd never been like that before. If she meant the way he was now, grabbing this moment for a public display of affection like they were two teenagers in high school again, then no, he'd never been like that, either.
But if she meant had he been like this, hungry and desperate for more of her, then the answer was yes. Always yes.”
― Alicia Thompson, Never Been Shipped

“He wanted to be wherever she was, and he wanted her to be wherever he was. Simple as breathing.”
― Ava Wilder, Some Kind of Famous

“You gave me the space to find the best version of myself. You showed me that love doesn't have to be chaos. It can be calm, and safe, and steady. And you showed me that I could be those things for you, too.... I want you, for as long as you'll have me.”
― Ava Wilder, Some Kind of Famous

“You’re not a problem, Misery. You’re a privilege.”
― Ali Hazelwood, Bride

“Isn’t that what any relationship is, in the end? Meeting someone and wanting to be with that person more than with anyone else, and trying to make it work.”
― Ali Hazelwood, Bride

“You told me that you loved me, Serena,” he says simply. His eyes are earnest, liquid. So profoundly good. “And while I’m willing to resign myself to an existence without the person I love, I refuse to condemn you to it.”
― Ali Hazelwood, Mate

“It seemed as if the world allowed pretty girls to do and say things for which they punished ordinary girls.”
― Libba Bray, Under the Same Stars

“Tomorrow. Tomorrow she'd eat cottage cheese and exercise and be the daughter everyone wanted her to be: a smaller version of herself.”
― Libba Bray, Under the Same Stars

“What happens next is this: He kisses her. It is Sophie's first kiss. It seems to her that, for as long as there are stars and a river of time running backward and forward, carrying the world moment by moment, this kiss will exist in every one of them.”
― Libba Bray, Under the Same Stars

“I want to marry you," he said.
My heart stopped. "You do?"
"Desperately."
"Oh," I whispered.
"I didn't know how you felt about it either. And I was afraid I would scare you away if I said something too soon, but I would have married you yesterday. I would have married you a month ago. A year ago. Five years ago."
"But you've had all those long-term relationships. And you've never even been engaged."
"Because I didn't want to spend the rest of my life with them.”
― Stephanie Perkins, Overdue