“There were books about how to be gay; he d seen them in stores and libraries. Some of them even had diagrams. But there weren t any diagrams about how to fall in love with your best friend and not fuck everything up.”
“Through all of youth I was looking for you without knowing what I was looking for”
“I m a Prince of Wales Trust ambassador, so I m all about giving youth an education, a voice and a chance to not take the wrong road.”
“It felt like waiting for something to happen. Which has to be the worth part of being young. So many of your decisions aren t yours; they re made by other people. Sometimes they re made badly by other people. Sometimes they re made by other people who have no idea what the consequences of those decisions might be. The bastards.”
“Cover her face; mine eyes dazzle. She died young.”
“You young people never say anything. And us old folks don t know how to stop talking.”
“Some people were just getting on with their lives, chatting, being young. It simply wouldn t do.”
“The real dawah to Islam is the character of a Muslim.”
“A boy s will is the wind s will, And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts.”
“What hurts so bad about youth isn t the actual butt whippings the world delivers. It s the stupid hopes playacting like certainties.”
“But you don t need anything. You have everything, I tell him. Rip looks at me. No I don t. What? No I don t. There s a pause and then I ask, Oh, shit, Rip, What don t you have? I don t have anything to loose.”
“what s right? If you want something, you have the right to take it. If you want to do something, you have the right to do it.”
“Grown people know that they do not always know the way of things, and even if they think they know, they do not know where and how they got the proof.”
“There is no absurdity so palpable but that it may be firmly planted in the human head if you only begin to inculcate it before the age of five, by constantly repeating it with an air of great solemnity.”
“We could love and not be suckers. We could dream and not be losers. It was such a beautiful time. Everything was possible because we didn t know anything yet.”
“She had to live in this bright, red gabled house with the nurse until it was time for her to die... I thought how little we know about the feelings of old people. Children we understand, their fears and hopes and make-believe.”
“I was horribly self-conscious; I wanted everybody to look at me and think me the most fascinating creature in the world, and yet I died a small hideous death if I saw even one person throw a casual glance at me.”