“I’m glad I married you too, Harper,” I whispered into her hair, “because I’m in love with you.” But she didn’t hear, gone into a dream.”

“I breathe just to be near you...”

“I'd discovered that the sun equated happiness. Its bright and lovely existence was hope incarnate. It exposed the dark, brought forth the light and showed you that no matter how strong or oppressive the night was, that it was infinitely stronger, exponentially more substantial and just because you couldn't see it with your eyes, didn't mean it wasn't still with you. it was stalwart and constant. It was infinite.”

“If you took everything I’d ever found hot in a girl and piled them into a corner, you’d get Cricket Hunt standing in a corner.”

“I ran up the stairs, shedding pieces of my suit as I went, determined for a shower, resolute in washing away what I’d just done, who I really was but I was certain there was nothing that could cleanse me, to launder my poisoned blood. This was who I was. Hopeless personified.”

“I can’t do that,” he said, exhaling sharply and staring out the glass into the street.“Why not?”His face softened. “I need his money.”Spencer looked at me and I couldn’t help but stare back. We were all in the same boat, prisoners to GREED.”

“Why me?” I secreted into her ear.“You were the only one I saw,” she whispered back, making my heart burst.”

“I followed suit, a little bit nervous, and very unaware of what I was supposed to do. I had that same sensation you get when you were new to a school and had no idea who anyone was in your lunch period. You’d take your lunch tray and sort of stand around for a moment looking for a good spot to take a seat but the entire time you’re searching, all you can feel is everyone’s eyes on you. That’s a shitty feeling.”

“I thought back to all the times I’d slept with a girl and not thought twice about it and my gut ached. If a girl doesn’t safeguard herself, who will? I’d always had the mentality that men will change when women change but I never thought about how safeguarding the girls around me was just as much my responsibility as it was theirs.”

“You may have misery,” she continued, ignoring my plea, “you may lose hope in the sorrow of an unplanned life but as long as you have faith and trust in adoration, in affection, in love, that sorrow will turn to happiness. And that is a constant, dear.” She breathed deeply and steadily for a moment, seemingly catching her breath.“No one can know sincere happiness, Sophie, without first having known sorrow. One can never appreciate the enormity and rareness of such a fiery bliss without seeing misery, however unfair that may be.“And you will know honest happiness. Of that I am certain. Certain because it’s why you are here and also because here is your inevitability.”

“We're all so afraid of what everyone around us thinks that we risk ourselves to desperation. It's utterly stupid. It's utterly frightening. But it's utterly human.”