Brutalities Quotes

“He told me she was known to be erratic and insane, but he was the only person I’d heard that from. To me, she appeared sweet, and delicate. She spoke in a soft voice and tucked her fluffy blond hair behind her ears a lot. I have no idea what the truth of what happened between them was, but where there’s smoke, there’s fire, as the saying goes, and some days as I cooked him eggs in our heavy cast-iron griddle I felt as if I was betraying every woman who ever lived.”
― Margo Steines, Brutalities: A Love Story

“N, still new to me, coming inside and sitting down, me thinking that we would have sex and he would leave and it would be whatever, but instead we kissed a little bit and then started talking and I heard myself telling him, in an unvarnished tone, things I usually conceal very carefully. I heard him telling me things men don’t often speak of, things people don’t usually tell each other. We talked about fear and feelings and alienation and pain, and we did not have sex, and when he left I felt closer to him than I ever had to anyone whose body I had shared.”
― Margo Steines, Brutalities: A Love Story