Window Shopping

Don’t trade emotional currency with strangers. You will never get a refund

When you’re younger, you think you know everything. Then you get older and live in constant awareness of how little you actually know and understand.”

. It was a shield of sorts in the beginning. They weren’t making fun of me, they were making fun of some kid in a bow tie.

Stop trying to be something that you’re not, Stella.
We’re the same, you and me.
You think you can change, but you can’t. People don’t change.
Your parents don’t understand you.
You said you’d always have my back. Prove it.

In fact, I’m very protective of her in a way I didn’t realize until now.

Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words are just a representation of the speaker’s insides—not me. And not you.

Maybe we should have the water blessed by a priest and burn the demons out of them,” Leland suggests. “St. Patrick’s is only a few blocks away. I could be back in no time.”

. “You never saw us, Seamus,” calls Aiden

“Hey, I took an extra sample of tandoori chicken at the supermarket once. Been looking over my shoulder for eight years since.”

Okay, sweetheart.” As if he senses that I need to be anchored, he squeezes me tight with his left forearm, stroking his right one down the back of my hair. “You’re okay.”