The Ghosts of Ashbury High Quotes

“Her skin is pale as watermelon sucked free of its juices.”
― Jaclyn Moriarty, The Ghosts of Ashbury High

“and if we can change
things that have
already happened

if those planes can fly in
uneasy formation

if that splinter moon
can blow away the shadows

then anything,
anything at all.”
― Jaclyn Moriarty, The Ghosts of Ashbury High

“And she looks at me with her eyes open wide and a face that says: Oh my God, I'm muckin' around in my sexy Jesus-boots, in my crazy dreamworld, and I've opened the door and let you in on my crazy dreamworld and that's so embarrassing but, actually, who cares? because it's funny.”
― Jaclyn Moriarty, The Ghosts of Ashbury High

“Emily said ... Well, I read that it's important to sleep. While you sleep, the hippopotamus in your brain replays things that happend during the day, e.g. what you studied. So therefore it remembers it for you.”
― Jaclyn Moriarty, The Ghosts of Ashbury High

“The Irish people didn't get on that well with each other either. They hated the Catholics, was the main issue, as I see. You can't blame them for that. If I understand correctly, Catholics do not believe in contraception. So, you know, sex is not relaxing.”
― Jaclyn Moriarty, The Ghosts of Ashbury High

“I am a student of love.”
― Jaclyn Moriarty, The Ghosts of Ashbury High

“I love her bare legs from a distance. When she's standing by a pool. When she's facing the water, thinking. Her legs are white as watermelon rind, veined blue from cold. There's that 'H' shape behind her knees. The H trembles softly with the swimming-water cold.”
― Jaclyn Moriarty, The Ghosts of Ashbury High

“There's a lot you can do with a name like Amelia.
You can play with it, sure, is what you think I'm going to say. Make it cute (Amy), or cuter (Millie), complaining (Meelie), or French, I guess, like the movie (Amélie).
You can step right into that name, is what I mean, and walk around. Swim with it or spill it on your shirt. Whisper it over like a sad, soft ache, or bark it out aloud like a mad, manic message: camellia, come heee-re, a-million, ah murder you, ye-eah.”
― Jaclyn Moriarty, The Ghosts of Ashbury High

“Dear Amelia,
I hear there are giant jellyfish in the Arctic,
tentacles longer than train carriages.
Haystacks fly over cities in whirlwinds, and fish frogs and turtles rain on towns.
There are spaces of perfect nothing that they call black holes.
Nothing's impossible- that's what you think I'm trying to say.
But I'm not.
There are things that are impossible - unimaginable even- and here they are: That I broke you.
Betrayed you.
Said I'd given up on you. Sent you flying to a park in a thunderstorm.
That I've been wrong about you all along- saw something in your face each time you faded to your past, when the opposite was true.
That all this time you've been lost and that I won't get a second chance to find you.
Amelia your name is a song. It's a name you can't say without smiling or crying, without casting both shadows and light. But there are too many places to hide or get lost in a name like Amelia.
So this is me shouting that name. They say nobody ever escapes from a black hole. They don't know the strength in my Amelia. The strength in your grip when you want to stay out dancing- the strength in your wicked smile.

Riley”
― Jaclyn Moriarty, The Ghosts of Ashbury High

“I hate those TV shows where characters talk about one thing, such as their patient on the operation table (let's say they're a doctor), then you realize they're actually talking about actually talking about themselves. The patient's open-heart surgery is nothing compared to their own messed-up heart or whatever. It's selfish. And means they're not concentrating, which is medical negligence.”
― Jaclyn Moriarty, The Ghosts of Ashbury High

“As if Riley and Amelia were lions, and we were a menage a trois of lively, prancing deer.”
― Jaclyn Moriarty, The Ghosts of Ashbury High

“You should have seen her this morning,' he said, smiling. 'She's got into the pantry and tipped a box of Cheerios all over the kitchen floor. I walk in and she's crawling around eating them as fast as she can. Mum's standing there, watching her - she got this embarrassed look when she saw me - she does, 'I know, I know, but I can't bring myself to stop her. She thinks she's hit the jackpot.”
― Jaclyn Moriarty, The Ghosts of Ashbury High

“Sure and you've got to keep your own spitis up, for there's no one else will do that for you!”
― Jaclyn Moriarty, The Ghosts of Ashbury High

“And everywhere I turned: Riley and Amelia.
I suppose this could have been because I was always following them around.”
― Jaclyn Moriarty, The Ghosts of Ashbury High

“She left behind her giant M, she's not getting my cabinet"
-Toby”
― Jaclyn Moriarty, The Ghosts of Ashbury High