This Sky Quotes

“Pain doesn’t really go away because someone kisses it better. Sadness doesn’t recede because a person posts an inspiring quote on your Facebook wall. Grief doesn’t sink into the shadows the moment the sun comes up. You can’t sleep your way through misery. There are some hurts that become a part of you, like your blood or your eyes or your teeth. Those are the ones that need to be lived over and over again.”
― Autumn Doughton, This Sky

“When he touches me, the sky and the earth switch places.”
― Autumn Doughton, This Sky

“Ending

I lied.
I wanted you from that moment.
I wanted you, wrapped in starlight and reflections,
To be tied up with strings.
And ropes.
And chains.
I wanted you hanging around my neck
Like a charm I could press to my heart and
Make three wishes on.

But I trapped the want
And the words inside my mouth.
I buried those secret things under my tongue,
Biting down until blood and bitterness
Filled my mouth
And poured down the back of my throat.

In the beginning, you said, there was only water.
But what about the end?

I closed my eyes and lay flat
With my back to the ocean
And my face to the sky.
I lifted my hands and caught ribbons of wind
Underneath my fingernails.
I rode the water for so long,
I forgot what my skin felt like when it was dry.”
― Autumn Doughton, This Sky

“It’s the kind of music you want to listen to while you lay on the grass and get lost in the sky. It feels like sunshine breaking on your skin.”
― Autumn Doughton, This Sky

“Maybe the point isn’t whether or not you become a moth or a butterfly. Maybe the point is that, either way, you’ve got wings.”
― Autumn Doughton, This Sky

“What you do need to know is this: Time moves differently when you’re getting over something big. For me, it slows—limping along on creaky wheels until the rusty engine blows and I’m here, stranded with nothing but a masking tape colored sky to look at.”
― Autumn Doughton, This Sky

“Maybe the truth is that all I’ve ever wanted is to be good for somebody else.”
― Autumn Doughton, This Sky

“Try, but not too hard.
Go, but not too far.
Jump, but wear a parachute to stop your fall.
Is that how life goes? Is there a secret formula? Or is every turn, every choice, going to be blocked by a messy jumble of rights and wrongs, bald hurts and happiness, risks and shimmering possibilities?”
― Autumn Doughton, This Sky

“A new song begins, and in the dark, we listen, letting lyrics about love and suffering and hope fall over us.”
― Autumn Doughton, This Sky

“This sky where we live is no place to lose your wings ”
― Autumn Doughton, This Sky

“I’m so far gone that I almost lift her face and kiss her on the mouth. I almost admit to her that I’m losing myself. I almost tell her I love her. Insane, I know.”
― Autumn Doughton, This Sky

“Pain doesn’t really go away because someone kisses it better. Sadness doesn’t recede because a person posts an inspiring quote on your Facebook wall. Grief doesn’t sink into the shadows the moment the sun comes up. You can’t sleep your way through misery.”
― Autumn Doughton, This Sky

“We said it from the beginning. No strings. No regrets. We lay, tangled in a web of sheets, Limbs and anemic light, And we passed promises back and forth like slippery stars. You told me you were recovering from A broken heart. I told you I was recovering from A broken life. Fair enough, we agreed and laughed.   We wrote stories on our bodies. Middles and endings Etched onto our feet and the palms of our hands. Our hopes were lettered in black and silver On a background of stark white flesh. We traded words on our tongues like tiny drops of melted sugar.”
― Autumn Doughton, This Sky

“I closed my eyes and lay flat With my back to the ocean And my face to the sky. I lifted my hands and caught ribbons of wind”
― Autumn Doughton, This Sky

“Wise words are all well and good when they are spoken by wise people, but when egomaniacal assholes are tossing them around, they are just words. ”
― Autumn Doughton, This Sky

“Wise words are all well and good when they are spoken by wise people, but when egomaniacal assholes are tossing them around, they are just words.”
― Autumn Doughton, This Sky

“Or we can settle in and watch every single episode of Sherlock.”     “Now you’re talking.” Benedict Cumberbatch is my homeboy.”
― Autumn Doughton, This Sky

“Holden Caulfield people are the bane of my existence.”
― Autumn Doughton, This Sky

“I probably could have handled things a hell of a lot better, but what do you do when someone shoves a grenade at you, pulls the pin and tells you to make the best of the situation? Fuck if I know.”
― Autumn Doughton, This Sky

“Did you ever think that maybe we’re like that?” she asks me.
I smile into the dark. How many times have I thought of myself as the ocean? “You think we’re like water?”
Gemma sits up. The salty wind coming off the water snaps her hair around her shoulders. With one hand in the middle of my chest, she tries to push me into the sand. I’m strong enough to hold her off, but I don’t want to. I willingly collapse back and she crawls over me. Holding a smile on her face, she slips her legs on either side of my hips and settles her weight on me.
In a voice thin as smoke, she says, “Well, maybe that’s how we start. Maybe, in the beginning, we’re nothing but a theoretical vast and empty sea with this huge open sky above us.”
Her hands press down on my stomach and her fingers pull at the bottom of my shirt. She leans forward until her breasts are rubbing against me and her mouth is almost touching the skin of my neck.
“Then slowly,” she continues, “over time, the currents change and we build up these continents inside our bodies.” Now her fingers walk a path from my bellybutton to my sternum. “And eventually, we have canyons and deserts and trees and beaches and all sorts of places where we can go and live.”
I suck in a breath as Gemma flattens her hand on the skin just above my heart and kisses me just below my ear. Then she turns her face, fitting the crown of her head beneath my jaw and says, “Most of the time we’re safe on the land, but sometimes we get sucked out to sea. What do you think happens then?”
I think about everything we’ve shared today. I think about Gemma and me. And how it feels like the geography inside of my own body is changing, how it’s been changing from the moment I met her. Maybe even before that.
And I think about the continents we’re building between us. The bridges of land moving from her fingers to mine and the valleys and mountains formed by her lips on my skin and her words in my head.
I use both of my hands to cup her face and pull her to my mouth. I press my lips to hers, parting her mouth and drinking in her breath. “I think you’d have to start swimming.”
A minute of silence ticks by.
Over the low drone of the waves on the beach, she whispers, “And what if you can’t swim very well?”
I think for a minute. “Then you fly.”
― Autumn Doughton, This Sky

“This is how you unraveled me. Thread by thread. Until I was bare, Wearing nothing but my skin And my bones And my blood.”
― Autumn Doughton, This Sky

“I lied. I wanted you from that moment. I wanted you, wrapped in starlight and reflections, To be tied up with strings. And ropes. And chains. I wanted you hanging around my neck Like a charm I could press to my heart and Make three wishes on.   But I trapped the want And the words inside my mouth. I buried those secret things under my tongue, Biting down until blood and bitterness Filled my mouth And poured down the back of my throat.   In the beginning, you said, there was only water. But what about the end?   I closed my eyes and lay flat With my back to the ocean And my face to the sky. I lifted my hands and caught ribbons of wind Underneath my fingernails. I rode the water for so long, I forgot what my skin felt like when it was dry.”
― Autumn Doughton, This Sky