_hellcat

“Pain can be beautiful," he says, exhaling a cloud of smoke. "It can transform. It can create."
"But I don't want to be in pain," says Henry hoarsely. "I want-"
"You want to be loved."
A small empty sound, half cough, half sob. "Yes."
"Then be loved."
"You make it sound simple."
"It is," says the stranger. "If you're willing to pay.”
― V.E. Schwab, The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue

“Finally the church bell tolls, the same low tone it calls at funerals, and she forces herself to her feet.
Her father touches her arm.
His face is sorry, but his grip is firm.
"You will come to love your husband," he says, but the words are clearly more wish than promise.
"You will be a good wife," says her mother, and hers are more command than wish.
And then Estele appears in the doorway, dressed as if she is in mourning. And why shouldn't she be? This woman who taught her of wild dreams and willful gods, who filled Adeline's head with thoughts of freedom, blew on the embers of hope and let her believe a life could be her own.”
― V.E. Schwab, The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue

“Another gust whips through, and Addie folds herself against it, eyes blurring. She shuffles sideways, onto a narrow street, just to escape the violent wind, and the sudden quiet, the breezeless peace, of the alley is like down, soft and warm. Her knees fold. She slumps into a corner against a set of steps, and watches her fingers turn blue, thinks she can see frost spreading over her skin, and marvels quietly, sleepily, at her own transformation. Her breath fogs the air in front of her, each exhale briefly blotting out the world beyond until the gray city fades to white, to white, to white. Strange, how it seems to linger now, a little more with every breath, as if she's fogging up a pane of glass. She wonders how many breaths until the world is hidden. Erased, like her.
Perhaps it is her vision blurring.
She does not care.
She is tired.
She is so tired.
Addie cannot stay awake, and why should she try?
Sleep is such a mercy.
Perhaps she will wake again in the spring, like the princess in one of her father's stories, and find herself lying in the grassy bank along the Sarthe, Estele nudging her with a worn shoe and teasing her for dreaming again.”
― V.E. Schwab, The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue

“Here," she says, pressing the pastry box into his hands. "Enjoy the party."
Henry's smile falls. His forehead rucks up like a carpet. "Why don't you come with me?"
And she doesn't know how to say I can't when there is no explaining why, when she was ready to spend all night with him. So she says, "I shouldn't," and he says, "Please," and she knows it is such a terrible idea, that she cannot hold the secret of her curse aloft over so many heads, knows she cannot keep him to herself, that this is all a game of borrowed time.
But this is how you walk to the end of the world.
This is how you live forever.
Here is one day, and here is the next, and you take what you can, savor every stolen second, cling to every moment, until it's gone.
So she says yes.”
― V.E. Schwab, The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue