Quotes from Sarah Dessen

Being a star requires risk-taking shoes.

So much hanging on just these things, tiny increments that together build a life. Like words build a story, and what had Ted said? One word can change the entire world

Some things are meant to be broken. Imperfect. Chaotic.

It was the very nature of summer. So many long, lazy days when blissfully, nothing changes, and then everything does, all at once.

With total strangers, it had always been my policy to expect the worst. Usually they-and those that you knew best, for that matter-did not disappoint.

She shook her head. Look. We both know life is short, Macy. Too short to waste a single second with anyone who doesn't appreciate and value you. You said the other day life was long, I shot back. Which is it? It's both, she said, shrugging. It all depends on how you choose to live it. It's like forever, always changing.

This isn't ideal. Very few things are. Sometimes, you have to manufacture your own history. Give fate a push, so to speak. You know?

But there was something I liked about the idea of those seeds buried so deep having at least a chance to emerge

We were there, together, and in the next room I could hear that monitor beeping. Keeping track of another heart's beat and giving enduring, solid proof of our own.

The thing is I'm a great believer in the perfect moment. They don't come around that often.

I looked at the sweatshirt again. 'You swim' is a philosophy? He shrugged. Better than 'you sink', right?

From up above, in a plane passing over, you'd just see one little light in all this dark, with no idea of the lives that were being lived within it, and in the house beside, and beside that one. So much happening in the world, night and day, hour by hour. It was no wonder we were meant to sleep, if only to check out of it for a little while.

No creo en el fracaso porque al decir que hemos fracasado, ya estamos admitiendo que lo hemos intentado. Y todo el que lo intenta no fracasa. Los que fracasan, en mi opinión, son los que ni siquiera lo intentan. Los que se quedan sentados en el sofá y se quejan y gimotean y esperan que el mundo cambie para ellos.

Maybe I'd just figured out there were some things you were better off not knowing

But against love, the case was solid. Easily argued. And you could, indeed, hold it in your hand.

Meanwhile, Morris settled into his seat with his signature slouch, neither knowing nor caring where I was taking him. Like destinations, in general, were vastly overrated. And maybe they were. As long as you were moving, you were always going somewhere.

It's not forever', she'd said, but to my mother, it might as well have been. She had make her choice, and this was it, where she felt safe, in a world she could, for the most part, control.

It's hard to do, I said. Wes looked at me. What is? I swallowed, not sure why I'd said this out loud. Get it right.

Who knew three dots could make such a difference? Like everything else, a love or a wish or whatever, it was all in the way you read it.

He's getting dumped. And he doesn't even know it yet. He's probably eating a cheeseburger or flossing or picking up his dry cleaning, and he has no idea. No inkling.

That was the nice thing about the Spot: you could hear everything, but no one could see you.

It passed, though. That was the bad thing. It always passed.

After loving someone you couldn't depend on, you realize how important it is to trust someone will do what they say. It's such a simple thing, not to promise what you can't or won't deliver. But my mom had done that all the time.

One word, Ted replied, dead serious, can change the whole world. There was a moment while we all considered this. Finally Lissa said to Chloe, loud enough for all of us to hear (she'd had a minibottle or two herself), I bet he did really well on his SATs.