Lia Carstairs

“Repeat after me: I didn’t deserve what they did to me.”​
Rhemann didn’t know what he was asking; he didn’t know what this would cost. Panic chewed a line from Jean’s gut to his heart. He couldn’t refuse a coach’s direct order, but he could beg: “Please don’t make me, Coach.”
​“I need you to say it and mean it, Jean,” Rhemann said. “Please.”​
Please was so uncalled-for Jean could only stare at him, heart hammering louder than his thoughts. He could feel every chain straining, waiting for the words that would rend them powerless at last. He was afraid to open his mouth again lest he get sick, but at length managed a hesitant, “I didn’t deserve—” heavy hands, heavier racquets, dark rooms, darker blood, teeth and knives and drowning, I’m drowning, I’m drowning “—what they did to me.”
― Nora Sakavic, The Golden Raven

“No one will take you seriously if you learn French with a southern accent.”
​“Does that really matter?” Jeremy asked, studying Jean with a stare that felt prying. “I’m not learning French for anyone but you.”
Getting kicked in the chest would be a little less painful.”
― Nora Sakavic, The Golden Raven

“If I threw a rock into the chasm between your talents and his, I don’t think I’d ever hear it hit bottom.”​ It was so uncharacteristically rude Jean could only stare at him.”
― Nora Sakavic, The Golden Raven

“It was Rhemann’s voice in his head, Rhemann’s and his friends’ and Neil’s, drowning out his miserable thoughts and excuses with unrelenting force. Jean squeezed his hands until his fingers went numb and willed himself to believe the words as he slowly spoke them into existence: “I deserve to get better.”
― Nora Sakavic, The Golden Raven