#coming-of-age

"Does our purpose on Earth directly link to the people whom we end up meeting? Are our relationships and experiences actually the required dots that connect and then lead us to our ultimate destinies?"

"I really believe that there is an invisible red thread tied between him and me, and that it has stretched and tangled for years — across oceans and lifetimes. I know that it won’t break because our souls are tied."

"I caught his hand. “What do you want me to do?”Leaning down, he kissed the pulse beating on my neck just above the damaged skin. “Tomorrow, I need you to die."

"I love him in ways that I can’t explain to other people. They don’t understand… it’s not their fault."

"Do you think we can be friends?” I asked.He stared up at the ceiling. “Probably not, but we can pretend."

"I could watch him do this until morning — never asking questions and never interrupting his work. I worship quietly — his intense focus and attention to detail and then, out of no where, I realize the inconvenient, inappropriate truth: ‘I love this man… and it has swallowed me."

"He’d used the amulet to read my thoughts again. I pictured smacking him in the face."

"The one thing I do remember is that as I retraced my steps through all the familiar streets of my life, Inow felt completely lost."

"I know that this process of ‘me changing my life’ doesn’t just end once I set fire to this list of things I hate about myself. Tonight isn’t as much of a new beginning as it is a violent end and I know the real work hasn’t even started yet."

"Vane’s lips tightened to suppress a smile. “Why so hostile, love?”“You whacked me on the head with a ball!”“You deserved it."

"Don’t worry if people think you’re crazy. You are crazy. You have that kind of intoxicating insanity that lets other people dream outside of the lines and become who they’re destined to be."

"I’ve always seen this in you, ever since you were a little girl — this hunger to love other people into their highest selves and it’s what has made me irreversibly and just so forever in love with you."

"I wanted to have a good relationship. One that's romantic and dramatic, like in the movies. But I finally became a woman at 17 and learned that men aren't really that simple."

"I just want your voice aimed at me again. I want to absorb the direction of your eyes…"

"Something, somewhere, knows what’s best for me and promises to keep sending me people and experiences to light my way as long as I live in gratitude and keep paying attention to the signs."

"I want to be the best version of myself for anyone who is going to someday walk into my life and need someone to love them beyond reason."

"Stop trying to be less of who you are. Let this time in your life cut you open and drain all of the things that are holding you back."

"If ever I was running, it was towards you."

"I’ve grown up defined by this desperate, undeniable, ‘can’t breathe’ kind of space inside of myself and I’m afraid that the diagnosis is fatal."

"High school will probably be better. I mean, some kids will still be jerks, but it's not so bad if you have at least one good friend. Someone who gets you."