“Never mind what you were doing, Olaf said. You're fired!
You can't fire me! Esme growled. I quit!
Well, you can leave by mutual agreement, Olaf grumbled and then with another succinct Ha! he lifted the harpoon gun and pointed it at Dewey Denouement.”

“Will interrupted. "Henry," he said, "you're on fire. You do know that, don't you?”

“Someone tapped him on the shoulder. he whirled around- and stared into the angry face of Milo Axelrod, his boss. "I told you to stay and mind the shop, dammit!" the druggist roared. "You're fired!" Bartlett snapped his fingers under the older man's nose. "And this here is how much I care," he said. "You can't fire me, on account of I damn well quit. They haven't called up my regiment yet, but I'm joining the Army now, is what I'm doing. Go peddle your pills- us real men will save the country for you. A couple of months from now, after we've licked the Yankees, you can tell me you're sorry."”

“The man that owned the company that I worked for called me into the office and said how can you be on our payroll and have your own New York Times ad! This has to stop! And I said but it can't I have orders to ship. And he said well you're fired. And that's how I started my business.”

“Suicide is man's way of telling God, 'You can't fire me - I quit!”

“Oh, yeah?" Leo growled. "Well, maybe you got the smoke, buddy, but I've got the fire.”

“I won't die, eaten alive," he said. He put a fresh clip in his gun. I'll do you first if you want, or you can do it yourself.
Save your bullets, Edward. I lifted a can of gasoline in one hand.
What are you planning? he asked.
I'm going to set the shed on fire. I splashed gasoline on the door. The smell was sharp and tugged at the back of my throat.
With us inside? he asked.
Yes.
I'd rather shoot myself, if it's all the same to you.”

“Before the Iraq war I was quite disturbed by some of the neoconservatives, who were saying things like, "What is the point of being a superpower if you can't do such-and-such, take on these responsibilities?" The point of being a superpower is that people will leave you alone.”

“If you're my friend I should be able to talk to you but I can't, and if I can't talk to you, well, what is the point of you? Of us?”

“Last night I dreamed about you. What happened in detail I can hardly remember, all I know is that we kept merging into one another. I was you, you were me. Finally you somehow caught fire.”