Quotes from Melissa Bank

It's all about judging, I said. I'm not sure I'm the judge type. I might be more of the criminal type. Judgement is power, he said.

I could bring you up on charges for that. What? Work harassment in the sexual place.

He tells me that he knows Max from freshman year—roughly twenty years—and I remember that a huge number of Oberlin friends are here and ask what bonds them all for life. He says No one else will be friends with us.

Happiness is just a dog sunning itself on a rock. We're not put on this earth to be happy. We're here to experience great things.

In a cab home from a jazz club, he said, "You act like I just want to sleep with you." He said, "I want to everything with you.

Even now, remembering the sound of his voice chastens every word I say.

We change into our bathing suits, both of us pale like larvae, and then we walk down to the water.

Oliver Biddle was who you became if you couldn't find anyone to love except your parents.

I saw my life in scale: it was just my life. It was not momentous, and only now did I recognize that it had once seemed so to me; that was while my father was watching.

He didn't remember because he'd seen thousands of little fish hundreds of times, and because it didn't mean to him what it had to me.

There are things that two people say in the middle of the night That don't make sense to a third at breakfast.

He's losing weight, I say. He doesn't sleep anymore. It occurs to me that this is how cults weaken the will of initiates. Robert says, It sounds to me like he's in love, and adds that the world's most coveted state is characterized by unrelieved insecurity and almost constant pain.

I have acute pancreatitis. I thought it was just average looking.

I remembered my father's speech about what Jack was capable of and wasn't; he'd said, IT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH HOW MUCH JACK LOVES YOU. I thought about all the girls he'd stopped loving; it was like he had a timer, and at a certain point it buzzed.

While home is the place where you can relax and be yourself, this doesn't mean that you can take advantage of the love and affection other members of your family have for you.

when i felt bobby staring at me, i looked up. our eyes met, and he held my gaze; he held my gaze like he was holding me, and i held him as though holding him. then he looked away, he was gone and it was over - a one-minute stand.

You're correcting my grammar now? Yes, I'm helping you to be better. And I expect the same from you. What if I don't want to be better?' Then you'll be just a petulant, infinitive-splitting eavesdropper.

You're correcting my grammar now? Yes, I'm helping you to be better. And I expect the same from you. What if I don't want to be better? Then you'll be just a petulant, infinitive-splitting eavesdropper.

She looked like someone who was used to having other people wait on her. I wonder what that's like, to never have to worry about filling the silence.

While Mother hostessed and Girlfriend guested, Younger Sister stood up. When there was a pause in their nicing, I made my mouth move smileward: I'd love to stay and talk, but I have to go shoot some heroin now.

After dessert, they invited me to go with them to the arts center for a Russian film with English subtitles. I said, I don't like to read during movies, and once Julia laughed it became a joke and made me feel that I was irrepressibly witty. So I went with them. It was the bleakest movie I'd ever seen; everyone died of heartbreak or starvation or both. At home, Julia threw herself on the sofa in Slavic despair and said, Please do get me some vodka.

Your mortality is at optimal distance, not up so close that it obscures everything else, but close enough to give you depth perception.

Jack knew how to make women fall in love with him, but that didn't exactly qualify him as a guidance counselor.

As ever, Sue was on the phone, and I could tell by her posture - she was half laying on the desk - that she was crying. I knew this was no distress but joy: She always cried when her boyfriend admitted that he was a complete idiot.