Francesca Marciano

“Whenever she walked along the streets of Manhattan, she looked at all the different faces coming toward her and, despite their different features and colors, she regarded them all as Americans.”

“You'll understand me when you're older. Then you'll see how men can blind you. And I mean blind you. To the point that you're no longer yourself.”

“It may be possible to forget our past but our past is not going to forget us.”

“These were the moments that would stick in her memory for years to come, those instants of perfect bliss that nothing else would ever match again.”

“It was nice to borrow a slice of extra time.”

“Maybe that's what happens with age, I thought. All your life you force yourself to forget people who have hurt you, but as you get older and weaker their memory surfaces again, like a bubble in the water. You have to surrender, because you feel to tired to fight it and push it down again. And maybe, unexpectedly, you find out that instead, of revamping your anger, those memories produce an unexpected sweetness.”

“Are you lovers?""Excuse me?""Do you mind my asking you?""Yes.""It's off the record.""Then why do you need to know?"Daniel Moore smiled. A large, happy smile."Because I would like to ask you to dinner.”

“Passion - eventually it cools.”

“You chose to live here now. You should try to live in the present.”

“I think part of me doesn't want to remember him, for fear of missing him too much.”

“I had fallen out of my secure world, precipitated beyond the territories I had only begun to control so skillfully. What a foolish step to take. What an insane move to make.”

“I can't say why some memories float and other sink.”

“Telling the truth can be a dirty job.”

“A first kiss is the demarcation line: the same information that a moment ago felt private, all of a suddens seems unfair to withhold. And with that exchange came more.”

“You know, when you're unhappy you don't have the strength left to take care of others. But it doesn't mean you don't love them.”