Jonathan Tropper: Likeness

“Childhood feels so permanent, like it's the entire world, and then one day it's over and you're shoveling wet dirt onto your father's coffin, stunned at the impermanence of everything.”

“I loved her for so long. Our past trails behind us like a comet's tail, the future stretched out before us like the universe. Things happen. People get lost and love breaks.”

“We are injured and angry, scared and sad. Some families, like some couples, become toxic to each other after prolonged exposure.”

“Love made us partners in narcissism, and we talked ceaselessly about how close we were, how perfect our connection was, like we were the first people in history to ever get it exactly right.”

“At some point, being angry is just another bad habit, like smoking, and you keep poisoning yourself without thinking about it.”

“I've never been shot, but this probably what it feels like, that second of nothingness right before the pain catches up to the bullet.”

“And even if you didn't fall in love in the eighties, in your mind it will feel like the eighties, all innocent and airbrushed, with bright colors and shoulder pads and Pat Benetar or the Cure on the soundtrack.”

“A problem is something to solve,” Phillip says. “If there’s no solution, it’s not a problem, so stop treating it like one.”

“What it must feel like, I thought, to look at something, anything really, and know that it’s for the last time?”

“A good speech is like a woman's skirt: short enough to hold your attention, long enough to cover the subject”

“Phillip is a repository of random snatches of film dialogue and song lyrics. To make room for all of it in his brain, he apparently cleared out all the areas where things like reason and common sense are stored.”