Beta Vulgaris Quotes

“Sometimes the best thing about someone is who they aren't.”
― Margie Sarsfield, Beta Vulgaris

“Elise wasnt anyone else. She was all the selves she had ever been, and if she couldn't be all those selves without suffering, then she wouldn't be anything at all.”
― Margie Sarsfield, Beta Vulgaris

“Even if you mess something up, which you won’t, who cares?” he asked. “You don’t owe these people anything.” But Elise, to her great shame, felt that she did. They were paying her, weren’t they? It was not very cool and punk and flannel of Elise to feel indebted to a corporation.”
― Margie Sarsfield, Beta Vulgaris: A Novel

“...but Elise was hanging back in the unstable galaxy of bliss that 'you're small' has thrust her into. Small like a maggot, small like a tooth. Obviously she wasn't small enough. If she were smaller, Tom would still be here.”
― Margie Sarsfield, Beta Vulgaris

“Sometimes Elise thought that being a wife would be like a rebirth. Maybe once you were something else entirely, the way a wife was something entirely different from a girlfriend, you got to abandon all the previous versions of yourself. At last, empty as a stomach.”
― Margie Sarsfield, Beta Vulgaris

“She wouldn't do anything; she couldn't do anything. Her whole life was one long tightrope walk over the sharp terrain of her frivolous, unmanageable emotions.”
― Margie Sarsfield, Beta Vulgaris

“She knew that the Moon was a cold gray rock tumbling through cold black space. That did not stop her from lifting her face toward it, eyes closed, expecting some warmth to reach her.”
― Margie Sarsfield, Beta Vulgaris

“She couldn't protect herself from herself, but she could protect him, and she would, for as long as he'd let her.”
― Margie Sarsfield, Beta Vulgaris

“He wasn't perfect. He was good enough, though.”
― Margie Sarsfield, Beta Vulgaris

“Aside from an academic interest in Buddhism that stemmed mostly from having had good experiences on psychedelics, Elise was not religious.”
― Margie Sarsfield, Beta Vulgaris: A Novel

“Th confusing way her sexuality expressed itself, unevenly, easy enough to pretend that she was only attracted to men, convincing herself she only called herself bi for attention. Or that she just wanted to be close to bodies she liked because she was trapped in one that she hated.”
― Margie Sarsfield, Beta Vulgaris

“The workers were beets, forever tumbling into whatever empty spaces required filling.”
― Margie Sarsfield, Beta Vulgaris

“But I'm not working on it. No self improvement for me. I plan on being exactly this terrible for the rest of my life.”
― Margie Sarsfield, Beta Vulgaris

“Touching Tom felt like nothing sometimes. It was like grabbing her own hand. Elise only noticed because of how sharply she'd felt the brush of Cee's arm against hers.”
― Margie Sarsfield, Beta Vulgaris

“The water was black, and the stars were only impressive because Elise was used to seeing so few of them.”
― Margie Sarsfield, Beta Vulgaris