52 Pickup Quotes

“You’re going through your menopause and you thought you were in love.”
― Elmore Leonard, 52 Pickup

“Quiet and calculating. He hasn’t changed that much since. Always mild-mannered, the nice guy—until someone steps over the line and challenges him.”
― Elmore Leonard, 52 Pickup

“That was the essence of the good feeling: to be able to remain calm and relax while he was keyed up and confident. Never panic. Never run. Face whatever had to be faced. Be practical, reasonable, up to a point. And if reason doesn’t work, get up and kick it in the teeth. Whatever the problem is.”
― Elmore Leonard, 52 Pickup

“She said very quietly, “Mitch?” “What?” “There’s somebody downstairs.” “I know there is.”
― Elmore Leonard, 52 Pickup

“Man was going to pay us a hundred and five grand so we don’t tell stories on him,” Bobby went on. “But Alan talk to the man, he say he find out the man don’t have any money. Owe it all to Uncle Sam.” “Alan told you that, huh?” “He’s the only one talk to him.” “You believe it?” “That’s where we’re at,” Bobby Shy said. “Well, you could talk to Alan again, put a pillow over his face.”
― Elmore Leonard, 52 Pickup

“Doreen looked up at him with the eyes, sitting on the edge of the flowery couch, rolling two professional joints, and said, “You never know who you can trust, do you?” “Deal we been working fell through,” Bobby Shy told her. And Doreen said, handing him a lighted joint, “I admire you, love, but please don’t tell me about it. They some things I don’t want to know.”
― Elmore Leonard, 52 Pickup

“Shit, you’re not a cop,” the girl said, “you’re a newspaper reporter. How’d you get into this? How much you make? Does your mother know you ball? Cop, you know where you stand. Newspaper reporter, he’s got a dirty mind, wants you to say dirty things he can’t write in the paper anyway. No, I’m sorry, I’m not answering any questions at all today about anything.”
― Elmore Leonard, 52 Pickup

“down”
― Elmore Leonard, 52 Pickup

“He missed her again, or still missed her, right now. That was the good feeling, wanting to be with her, wanting to touch her. He had said to her it was like starting over. Or like coming home after a long business trip. Last night, undressing together in the bedroom had reminded him of that, of coming home and going up to the bedroom, no matter what time of the day it was, and making love, not doing much fooling around but getting right in there and doing it, feeling the sweat breaking out on their bodies. There were other times for fooling around and being naked together and making it last. Though she didn’t have to be naked to arouse him. She could sit down in a chair, holding her skirt to her thigh as she crossed her legs, and he would want to make love to her. She could be sewing a button on his coat and look up at him, over the top of her reading glasses, and he would want to make love to her: undress her in the stillness of a Sunday afternoon with sunlight framed in the bedroom windows and the phone pulled out of the jack and make slow love to her, feeling her make her gradual change from lady to woman. Dressed, she was a lady. In bed she was a woman.”
― Elmore Leonard, 52 Pickup

“Whether you’re faking one or the other it isn’t worth the state you get yourself in.”
― Elmore Leonard, 52 Pickup