Aimee Bender citations

“Many kids, it seemed, would find out that their parents were flawed, messed-up people later in life, and I didn't appreciate getting to know it all so strong and early.”

“I want to be violated by insight.”

“I give boring people something to discuss over corn.”

“We hit the sidewalk, and dropped hands. How I wished, right then, that the whole world was a street.”

“I could feel the tears beginning to collect in my throat again, but I pushed them apart, away from each other. Tears are only a threat in groups.”

“Mom loved my brother more. Not that she didn't love me - I felt the wash of her love every day, pouring over me, but it was a different kind, siphoned from a different, and tamer, body of water. I was her darling daughter; Joseph was her it.”

“I was with them for all of it, but more like an echo than a participant.”

“and I get refill number three or four and the wine is making my bones loose and it's giving my hair a red sheen and my breasts are blooming and my eyes feel sultry and wise and the dress is water.”

“To see someone you love, in a bad setting, is one of the great barometers of gratitude.”

“Light is good company, when alone; I took my comfort where I found it, and the warmest yellow bulb in the living-room lamp had become a kind of radiant babysitter all its own.”

“…kissing George was a little like rolling in caramel after spending years surviving off rice sticks.”

“I didn’t mind the quiet stretches. It was like we were trying out the idea of being side by side.”

“My eyelids are my own private cave, he murmured. That I can go to anytime I want.”

“There's a gift in your lap and it's beautifully wrapped and it's not your birthday. You feel wonderful, you feel like somebody knows you're alive, you feel fear because it could be a bomb, because you think you're that important.”

“Several of the girls at the party had had sex, something which sounded appealing but only if it could happen with blindfolds in a time warp plus amnesia”

“It was like we were exchanging codes, on how to be a father and a daughter, like we'd read about it in a manual, translated from another language, and were doing our best with what we could understand.”

“It is so often surprising, who rescues you at your lowest moments.”

“It seemed to happen in springs, the revealing of things.”

“… a Dorito asks nothing of you, which is its great gift. It only asks that you are not there.”

“I was right at the edge of their circle, like the tail of a Q…”

“My lover is experiencing reverse evolution.”

“The wine glasses are empty except for that one undrinkable red spot at the bottom.”

“That's the thing with handmade items. They still have the person's mark on them, and when you hold them, you feel less alone.”

“When the light at Vernon turned green, we stepped into the street and George grabbed my hand and the ghosts of our younger selves crossed with us.”