“When they asked some old Roman philosopher or other how he wanted to die, he said he would open his veins in a warm bath. I thought it would be easy, lying in the tub and seeing the redness flower from my wrists, flush after flush through the clear water, till I sank to sleep under a surface gaudy as poppies. But when it came right down to it, the skin of my wrist looked so white and defenseless that I couldn't do it. It was as if what I wanted to kill wasn't in that skin or the thin blue pulse that jumped under my thumb, but somewhere else, deeper, more secret, and a whole lot harder to get at.”

“Existence is this, I thought, a start of joy, a stab of pain, an intense pleasure, veins that pulse under the skin, there is no other truth to tell.”

“i could see the veins through your skin like a map to inside you. how could skin be that thin? i was so afraid you might drop and break. i stopped breathing so you wouldn't.”

“Speaking of death, LeBlanc boasted he could kill me in the waiting room. I broke his wrist. He wasn't impressed.”

“I stopped. She was bleeding after all. Perfect lines crossed her wrists, not near any crucial veins, but enough to leave wet red tracks across her skin. She hadn; t hit her veins when she did this; death hadn't been her goal.”

“I went to the door, and Gary tried hard not to notice I was blue. He looked at his feet, and he looked above my head, and he cleared his throat.

It's okay,' I said. 'I know I'm blue.'

It caught me by surprise,' he said. 'I didn't want to seem rude.”

“"4 example the other day i saw a black person walking down the street and i was like "omg a negro" but instead of walking on the other side i said "what would rumsfeld do?" so i stayed on the sidewalk. when he came up to me i wanted to show him that i have no problems with people of color so i said "hey" and offered him my spare change before he could even ask."”

“I put a What Would Jesus Do bracelet on my Jewish friend's wrist and it burned his skin. He threw it on the ground, it turned into a serpent, we both started laughing. We left it there, we hate snakes. We think they're slimy, even though we know they're not.”

“He was still stroking the inside of her wrist, his touch doing odd delicious things to her skin and nerves.”

“Curran struck at my wrist. His fingers were cat-quick, but I had spent my life honing my reflexes, and he missed.
“Well, look at that.” I studied my free wrist. “Denied. Good-bye”