Addie Quotes

“Whatever cosmic attraction had drawn [Jess & Addie] to one another in the first place was beginning to fill in with the chinks and mortar of very real, very likeable human traits.”

“Once Addie let someone in, she was impossible to forget. There was something about her that crawled inside a person and built a nice comfy home there, her goodness expanding until it filled every limb.”

“Anyway, I do not want you thinking that I or Addie or Joe or Skeezie feel sorry for ourselves. We do not. Other people may call us names or think we're weird or whatever, but that does not mean we believe them. We may be misfits, but we're okay. Leastwise, in our own eyes we are, and that's all that matters.”

“Kids who get called the worst names oftentimes find each other. That's how it was with us. Skeezie Tookis and Addie Carle and Joe Bunch and me. We call ourselves the Gang of Five, but there are only four of us. We do it to keep people on their toes. Make 'em wonder. Or maybe we do it because we figure that there's one more kid out there who's going to need a gang to be part of. A misfit,like us.”

“Kids who get called the worst names oftentimes find each other. That's how it was with us. Skeezie, Tookis and Addie Carle and Joe Bunch and me. We call ourselves the Gang of Five, but there are only four of us. We do it to keep people on their toes. Make 'em wonder. Or maybe we do it because we figure that there's one more kid out there who's going to need a gang to be part of. A misfit,like us.”

“[Jess]"... you were wonderful. Magnificent. Incomparable. Unparalleled. Incredible.""Oh, stop it!" Addie grinned and blushed, and backed a step with each word, as Jess advanced toward her with each accolade. But on the third step, her back made contact with the ivy wall, and Jess kept moving toward her until he'd pressed her into its soft, green embrace. Then he moved another inch until his Sunday boots straddled her Sunday pumps.”

“You'd been in Sunday school long enough to know how the story goes: the voice of God comes down from the sky and asks you to go where you don't want to go, to do what you don't want to do. And you have to do it anyway.”

“When people confide their deep hurt to you these days, you are at a loss for what to say. A long time ago, you used to say, "I'll be praying for you," and you always meant to do that, to take those heavy burdens off their shoulders and hoist them up to the Lord. But the truth is, you usually forgot. Usually, this was the thing you said to end the conversation, a nice way to say, "I'm sorry. I can no longer handle the depth of your pain. I don't want to talk about this anymore.”

“Yeah, it's kind of shitty," I say. I add the shitty on purpose as a kind of a test. I’ve been using it a lot lately to weed the dangerous Christians out of my life: the ones who have the power to hurt me. Throw out a shit or a damn or a what the hell, and see if you get The Look. Watch to see if the person shifts uncomfortably or looks down at her hands … then you know: this is a Dangerous Christian. The kind who will not be able to handle the truth of your pain, the kind that requires some swearing.”