“I watch her blond head until it disappears around the bend, and I feel bare, like there’s nothing left to protect me against pain. Her absence stings worst of all.”

It will be difficult to break the habits of thinking Abnegation instilled in me, like tugging a single thread from a complex work of embroidery. But I will find new habits, new thoughts, new rules. I will become something else.

It’s strange how a word, a phrase, a sentence, can feel like a blow to the head.

I feel the monster of grief again, writhing in the empty space where my heart and stomach used to be.

If I let a little of the emotion out, all of it will come out, and it will never end.

Sorry, am I being rude?” she asks. “I’m used to saying whatever is on my mind.

Dauntless: being brave in the midst of fear.

All I can do is stand still- I feel like if I just stand still, I can stop it from being true, I can pretend that everything is all right.

Killing you is not the worst thing they can do to you,” I say. “Controlling you is.

But when a book comes out, it’s just hundreds of opinions and you have to learn to separate out the ones you want to listen to or figure out many you want to listen to.

My mother knit scarves for the neighborhood kids. My father helped Caleb with his homework. There was a fire in the fireplace and peace in my heart, as I was doing exactly what I was supposed to be doing, and everything was quiet.

We believe in shouting for those who can only whisper, in defending those who cannot defend themselves.

There are so many ways to be brave in this world.

I feel like myself, strong and weak at once – allowed, at least for a little while, to be both.

I think they’re going to force us to eat lots of cake and then take an unreasonably long nap.

Sometimes all I want is to be a few inches taller so the world does not look like a dense collection of torsos.

Not writing is as important as writing – go out into the world and remember how interesting it, and the people in it, are.

I inoculate myself against the fear of failure.

Now he has to fear the backlash against himself and his loved ones when he was only doing his job.

Those whose character is mean and vicious will rouse others to animosity against them.

Their is no defense against criticism except obscurity.

My business is not reading your messages. I don’t have a business doing that. And it’s against my values to do that. I don’t want to read your private stuff.

It is remarkable how little agitation there is against those practices.

The Bible’s purpose is to show you how God’s grace breaks into your life against your will and saves you from the sin and brokenness otherwise you would never be able to overcome…

I trailed off.Patch leaned lazily against the counter. Dark hair flipped out from under his ball cap. A smile tugged at his mouth. My thoughts dissolved and just like that, a new thought broke the surface of my mind. I wanted to kiss him. Right now.