The Rumour Quotes

“All the significant moments in our life hinge on choices made in the blink of an eye.”
― Lesley Kara, The Rumour

“Rumours are like seeds, scattered on the wind. There’s no telling where they’ll land, but land they will. Settling in cracks and crevices, the roots take hold. The seeds sprout. It doesn’t matter if they’re true or false. The more times they’re spoken, the faster and stronger they grow. Like beanstalks, waving in the air.”
― Lesley Kara, The Rumour

“I love his idea that we’re nourished by all the shitty things that happen to us in life, that we become better people as a result.”
― Lesley Kara, The Rumour

“He who fights with monsters should be careful lest he thereby become a monster. And if thou gaze long into an abyss, the abyss will also gaze into thee.”
― Lesley Kara, The Rumour

“A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes – Mark Twain.”
― Lesley Kara, The Rumour

“There's darkness in everyone's soul. [...] We're *all of us* capable of evil thoughts and evil acts under certain circumstances.”
― Lesley Kara, The Rumour

“When I'm working on a project, it consumes me," she says. "Nothing else matters. Nothing. The normal niceties of social interaction. Commitments like books club." She points to her disheveled hair and smiles. "Personal grooming. It all falls by the wayside.”
― Lesley Kara, The Rumour

“Much as I try to kid myself that I've got the best of both worlds, this continual worry that I might actually end up with nothing at all never goes away.”
― Lesley Kara, The Rumour

“Glasine su poput sjemena koje raznosi vjetar. Nitko ne zna kamo će sletjeti, ali sigurno kad-tad hoće. Zavući će se u rupu i procijepe, pustiti korijenje. Proklijat će. Nije važno jesu li glasine lažne, jesu li istinite. Što ih se češće ponavlja, to postaju snažnije i brže. Rastu poput čarobnoga graha, nezaustavljivo jure uvis.”
― Lesley Kara, The Rumour

“But if you think I haven’t been punished, you’re wrong.’ She taps the side of her head. ‘What goes on in here is my punishment. This is my life sentence and it never stops, Marie. It never stops.”
― Lesley Kara, The Rumour

“We’re all of us capable of evil thoughts and evil acts under certain circumstances.”
― Lesley Kara, The Rumour

“As we leave the restaurant and step out on to the street, we’re like one of those soppy couples in a romantic movie. The bit at the end where, after all the misunderstandings and confusion, all the tears and the heartache, they’ve finally found each other again and are about to live happily ever after. But then the shouting begins.”
― Lesley Kara, The Rumour

“He’ll be devastated if Michael moves in, only to move out again a few months later. He won’t understand. I’ll be devastated too. I know that now. ‘It just seems a bit … unexpected, that’s all. One minute we’re jogging along like we always have, then I tell you about that rumour and all of a sudden you want to move in.’ ‘Look, I’ll admit it might seem that way,’ he says. He exhales slowly, pushes a piece of chicken around on his plate with his fork. ‘But, honestly, I’ve been wanting to ask you for months.’ He puts down his glass and looks directly into my eyes. ‘Years, if you must know.’ Now it’s my turn to stare. ‘Years?’ ‘You’ve always been so fiercely independent. I thought if I asked for more, you might … I don’t know, pull up the drawbridge completely.’ I clasp my hands on my lap. Is he actually saying what I think he is? That he’s been too scared to tell me how he feels? That I’ve basically been pushing him away all this time? ‘I … I always assumed you …’ My voice breaks. Any second now I’m going to start crying over my pasta. I shut my eyes tight and focus on my breath. ‘I always assumed you wanted the freedom to just take off whenever you liked.’ Michael reaches across the table and strokes my cheek with his finger. ‘What a couple of idiots we both are.’ ‘You can say that again.”
― Lesley Kara, The Rumour

“thought I’d rent it out on Airbnb,’ he says. ‘That way, I only have to bring my clothes and personal bits and pieces. Leave all the bigger stuff there.’ It’s a good idea, I know it is. It’ll be quicker than renting it out via an agency and there’s no room for any of Michael’s furniture in my cottage. But that annoying little voice has started up again. Because it’s also more temporary, isn’t it? Easier for him to move back in when he’s had enough of playing house”
― Lesley Kara, The Rumour

“says something that I know more about the geography of his face and body than I do about his mind, but then we’ve always skated around the edges of our inner lives. Letting each other in just as far as was needed and no further. Why is that? How have we let that happen?”
― Lesley Kara, The Rumour

“It’s happening again. Don’t ask me how I know. I just do. I see it in the roll of the waves, the way they’re bearing in at a slant. Fast. Relentless. I feel it in the nip of the air on my skin, smell it in the rotting leaves and damp earth, hear it in the silence of the watching crows. You’re coming for me again and there’s nothing I can do to stop you. This is how it happens. One night I go to bed and everything’s fine. Everything’s under control. The story has ceased to be a story. It’s real. Solid. Unbreakable. Then I wake up and it’s changed. Cracks have appeared overnight and I realize that I’ve been fooling myself all this time, that I’ve only ever been the most fragile of constructions. I’m the hunted. I’ll always be the hunted.”
― Lesley Kara, The Rumour

“He who fights with monsters should be careful lest he thereby become a monster.”
― Lesley Kara, The Rumour

“like seeds, scattered on the wind. There’s no telling where they’ll land, but land they will. Settling in cracks and crevices, the roots take hold. The seeds sprout. It doesn’t matter if they’re true or false. The more times they’re spoken, the faster and stronger they grow. Like beanstalks, waving in the air.”
― Lesley Kara, The Rumour

“That’s the great thing about children. They live in the moment and, right now, he’s happy.”
― Lesley Kara, The Rumour

“He who fights with monsters should be careful lest he thereby become a monster. And if thou gaze long into an abyss, the abyss will also gaze into thee.’ Friedrich Nietzsche”
― Lesley Kara, The Rumour

“All the significant moments in our life hinge on choices made in the blink of an eye. Choices that define us for ever.”
― Lesley Kara, The Rumour