The Night Club

“Haven’t you ever wondered what it would be like to have nothing keeping you attached to the ground?””

— Unknown

“She’s having a hard time right now because you’re not what she expected. But we’re never what our parents expected. They have to learn that lesson.””

— Unknown

“Here was her mother sitting down across from her, reaching for her hands and chafing them as if she were frozen. She felt the rub of her mother’s wedding ring against her skin, and her mother’s face swam into focus, her brown eyes full of the sharp worry of love, and Lily thought, You will never look at me like this again.””

— Unknown

“Are you like the girls in the book too? Because I think I am.””

— Unknown

“She wondered where Kath was. She wondered if Kath could sense her, sitting here on this train as it took her away. Perhaps it was possible, if she closed her eyes and sent out her thoughts along the steel track like a message along a telegraph wire.I love you. I love you.The train swayed gently beneath her, and she leaned against the window to feel the cool glass against her cheek, and she was sure that Kath had heard her, she was sure.””

— Unknown

“Perhaps that was the most perverse part of this: the inside-outness of everything, as if denial would make it go away, when it only made the pain in her chest tighten, when it only made her emotions clearer.””

— Unknown

“It wasn’t like chocolate, Lily thought. It was like finding water after a drought. She couldn’t drink enough, and her thirst made her ashamed, and the shame made her angry.””

— Unknown

“How am I supposed to know?” she asked instead. “What’s it supposed to be like?”Lana and Claire traded tiny smiles, and Claire asked gently, “What’s what supposed to be like?”Lily slumped back against the sofa, feeling boneless and muddled. “Falling in love, I guess.”“You’ll know,” Claire said. “It’s unmistakable.”(How she could recognize Kath at the other end of a crowded Galileo hallway by the way she walked.)“It’s like . . . well, it’s like falling,” Lana said. “Falling, or floating, or sinking.”(Every time they kissed.)“You won’t know which way is up.”“It’s like having a fever.”(The way the world seemed to narrow down to the tips of Kath’s fingers.)“It’s like being drunk”

— Unknown

“Now she was confused, as if she’d been reading a book that had several pages removed, but hadn’t realized the pages were gone until this moment.””

— Unknown