Hide Quotes

“People pretend things aren’t wrong, even when they can feel the truth, because they’re too afraid of what it means to look right at the horror, right at the wrongness, to face the truth in all its terrible glory. Like little kids, playing hide-and-seek. If they can’t see the monster, it can’t get them. But it can. It always can. And while you aren’t looking, it’s eating everyone around you.”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“If all the world is hell and evil is all around them, what else can they do but try to help each other?”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“Finally, to everyone who still insists they pulled themselves up by their own bootstraps: For fuck’s sake, look up the origin of the saying.”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“To the youngest generations we’ve tasked with saving us all: You shouldn’t have to. I’m so sorry.”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“No one who is strong hits a child.”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“He’s never been friends with a lesbian before. He doesn’t think they have any in Idaho.”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“It’s not fun anymore, but it’s important now, and he likes that.”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“The sun creeps along, as the sun is wont to do. The occasional insect wanders across Mack’s legs, as insects are wont to do. Mack does nothing, as Mack is wont to do.”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“There was nothing fancy about his grandma, only funny warmth and honesty. Always honesty. Brandon misses her so much. Nothing's been the same since she died, which is even sadder, because nothing has changed.”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“What a generation long before her summoned and paid for, and what subsequent generations decided to make others pay for. Trickle-down economics. They got the economy, and the blood trickled down the decades.”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“I’m not due to start my period for at least two more weeks,” Jaden says in falsetto.
Ava pats him on the shoulder. Cuffs him, more like. “My man, I’ve passed blood clots with more stamina than you.”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“Maybe people don't owe you their gender”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“He thinks Jesus would like Brandon, would understand that Brandon made his choice to save others.”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“The waiting is terrible, and the fact that the waiting is boring feels somehow crueler. Terror shouldn’t be boring, shouldn’t be a slog through infinite empty hours. It should be sharp and quick and final.”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“He doesn't love you," she said matter-of-factly. "He didn't love your mother, either, and I don't want you to spend your whole life waiting for something he can't give. Men like that, people are things to them. That's why he can pick you up and drop you as easily. But you're not a thing, Brandon. You're wonderful, and if he can't see that, he's broken. Not you. Don't ever forget it.”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“Mack looks back at the maze that housed a monster that fed in youth and hope and stalled dreams. That ground up vulnerable people so the ones in power could keep their power, could keep their safety, could keep everything.”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“Atrius like the insurance?” the clipboard guy asks.
“No, like the—” He sighs. “Yeah. I named myself after health insurance. It’s social commentary. I can’t get insurance, so I became insurance.”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“It makes her want to scream, this feeling, this hope that feels more dangerous than anything stalking them. Because the hope has already found her, already snared her, already sunk in its claws that will absolutely eviscerate her when it's ripped away.”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“The idea that there's an end point, a goal, is gossamer floating on the air, sparkling and ephemeral.”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“Who fucking cares?”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“He doesn't love you," she said matter-of-factly. "He didn't love your mother, either, and I don't want you to spend your whole life waiting for something he can't give. Men like that, people are things to them. That's why he can pick you up and drop you as easily. But you're not a thing, Brandon. You're wonderful, and if he can't see that, he's broken. Not you. Don't ever forget that.”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“She missed death the first time it came for her, and she was ready—maybe even eager—for it here. For that last, final, ultimate hiding place, the darkness in which no one could ever find her. Not her father, not her guilt or her shame, not hunger or fear or want.”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“I always wanted to go to Disneyland. Or Lagoon, in Utah. Have you guys ever been? But my dad would never take me on his visits.”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“She’s so sick of trying to turn everything into an opportunity, trying to exploit every hobby, every interest, every talent, even her own fucking face and body in a desperate attempt to make enough money. The last time they spoke—a year ago, maybe?—her father accused her of being lazy, of not working, but the truth is, like everyone her age she knows, she’s always working. She’s just not making a living doing any of it. Yet.”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“So now she's seen it. She [Mack] knows what's out there. It doesn't make any more sense than it did before, but at least she can move from horror, the fear of the unknown, and into terror, the fear of the known. Terror is almost a comfort at this point, a familiar friend.”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“They came here, desperate, lured by the promise of finally winning something, set up to be devoured so people who already had everything would continue having exactly what they already had, what they could have had anyway, what they felt was their due.”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“They came here, desperate, lured by the promise of finally winning something, set up to be devoured so people who already had everything would continue having exactly what they already had, what they could have had anyway, what they felt was their due. What they were willing to let fourteen hopeful souls pay for.”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“And Mack has no questions about that: He chose to do what he did. He looked at the world and felt it owed him more than he had, and when that didn’t materialize, he took himself out along with everyone who had tried to love him, who might have been happier without him.”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“She pushes on, knowing this is far enough, but needing to see for herself the center of it all. What a generation long before her summoned and paid for, and what subsequent generations decided to make others pay for. Trickle-down economics. They got the economy, and the blood trickled down the decades.”
― Kiersten White, Hide

“Ava reappears, face grim, pockets bulging. She shakes a prescription bottle at Linda. “This label accurate?” Linda frowns, offended, gently dabbing the side of her head with a washcloth. “Why wouldn’t it be?” Ava takes two pills, swallows them dry. “I can’t afford this shit, and I actually need it.” “It’s not my fault you’re poor,” Linda snarls.”
― Kiersten White, Hide