Sara Gruen

“Even as your body betrays you, your mind denies it.”

“How hard can it be to find a girl and an elephant for Christ's sake?”

“After sixty-one years together, she simply clutched my hand and exhaled.”

“Is where you're from the place you're leaving or where you have roots?”

“He only had the imperfect medium of words.”

“You do right by me, I'll show you a life most suckers can't even dream of.”

“With a secret like that, at some point the secret itself becomes irrelevant. The fact that you kept it does not.”

“I want her to melt into me, like butter on toast. I want to absorb her and walk around for the rest of my days with her encased in my skin.I want.”

“I scan the room. Catherine is writing quickly, her light brown hair falling over her face. She is left-handed, and because she writes in pencil her left arm is silver from wrist to elbow.”

“I stare at her for a long moment. I want to kiss her. I want to kiss her more than I've ever wanted anything in my life.”

“Don't mind Russ," he says. "He's a good kid underneath all those holes, although it's a wonder he doesn't spring a leak when he drinks”

“Sometimes when you get older—and I'm not talking about you, I'm talking generally, because everyone ages differently—things you think on and wish on start to seem real. And then you believe them, and before you know it they're a part of your history, and if someone challenges you on them and says they're not true—why, then you get offended.”

“And then I laugh, because it's so ridiculous and so gorgeous and it's all I an do to not melt into a fit of giggles. So what if I'm ninety-three? So what if I'm ancient and cranky and my body's a wreck? If they're willing to accept me and my guilty conscience, why the hell shouldn't I run away with the circus? It's like Charlie told the cop. For this old man, this IS home.”

“It seems there's nothing so good or pure it cant be taken without a moment's notice. And then in the end, it all gets taken anyway.”

“When will people learn that just because you can make something doesn’t mean you should?”

“When I first submerged my feet into frigid water, they hurt so badly I yanked them out again. I persisted, dunking them for longer and longer periods, until the cold finally blistered.”

“The person following is never in control, which she knows full well and which is exactly why she does it.”