Top 301 Quotes & Sayings by Rainbow Rowell - Page 2

He never hurries. He never shows his cards. He always hangs up first....Like when we first started talking on the phone, he would always be the one who got off first. When we kissed, he always pulled away first. He always kept me just on the edge of crazy. Feeling like I wanted him too much, which just made me want him more....[It was] excruciating and wonderful. It feels good to want something that bad. I thought about him the way you think about dinner when you haven't eaten for a day and a half. Like you'd sell your soul for it.

I don't have to forgive you, Cath said. It's not like that with you. You're just in with me. Always. No matter what happens.

Nothing before you counts,” he said. “And I can’t even imagine an after.

Well,” she said. “I’m frustrated.” “Don’t make me angry-kiss you.” “Give me the laundry.” “Tempers rising, faces flushed … This is how it happens.

She knew she was lovely, and she shared it like a gift. Every smile from Agatha was like waking up to a perfect sunny day. Agatha knew it. And she smiled at everyone who crossed her path, as if it were the most generous thing she could offer.

Lincoln?” she (Beth) asked. “Yes?” “Do you believe in love at first sight?” He made himself look at her face, at her wide-open eyes and earnest forehead. At her unbearably sweet mouth. “I don’t know,” he said. “Do you believe in love before that?” Her breath caught in her throat like a sore hiccup. And then it was too much to keep trying not to kiss her.

Eleanor hadn't written him a letter. It was a postcard. GREETINGS FROM THE LAND OF 10,000 LAKES it said on the front. Park turned it over and recognized her scratchy handwriting. It filled his head with song lyrics. He sat up. He smiled. Something heavy and winged took off from his chest. Eleanor hadn't written him a letter, it was a postcard. Just three words long.

Nothing was dirty. With Park. Nothing could be shameful. Because Park was the sun, and that was the only way Eleanor could think to explain it.

Ah." He set down his backpack and pulled out their notebook. "You're working on your final project?" "Indirectly," Cath said. "What does that mean?" "Have you ever heard sculptors say that they don't actually sculpt an object; they sculpt away everything that isn't the object?" "No." He sat down. "Well, I'm writing everything that isn't my final project, so that when I actually sit down to write it, that's all that will be left in my mind.

Until this moment, she’d kept Park in a place in her head that she thought Richie couldn't get to. Completely separate from this house and everything that happened here. (It was a pretty awesome place. Like the only part of her head fit for praying.)

You give away nice like it doesn't cost you anything.

This is new to us, you know? Your mother's sorry. She's sorry that she hurt your feelings, and she wants you to invite your girlfriend over for dinner." "So that she can make her feel bad and weird?" "Well she is kind of weird, isn't she?" Park didn't have the energy to be angry. He sighed and let his head fall back on the chair. His dad kept talking. "Isn't that why you like her?

You win when no one finds you, even if they're not looking.

He made her feel like more than the sum of her parts.

The whole point of fanfiction is that you get to play inside somebody else's universe. Rewrite the rules. Or bend them. The story doesn't have to end. You can stay in this world, this world you love, as long as you want, as long as you keep thinking of new stories.

Things get better--hurt less--over time. If you let them.

I don’t like you, Park. Sometimes I think I live for you

Drinking tequila is more about the journey than the destination

Holding Eleanor’s hand was like holding a butterfly. Or a heartbeat. Like holding something complete, and completely alive. As soon as he touched her, he wondered how he’d gone this long without doing it. He rubbed his thumb through her palm and up her fingers, and was aware of her every breath.

He'd stopped trying to bring her back. She only came back when she felt like it anyway, in dreams and lies and broken-down deja-vu.

Can't you just like a girl who likes you back?' 'None of them likes me back. I may as well like the one I really want.

It was like their lives were overlapping lines, like they had their own gravity. Usually, that serendipity thing felt like the nicest thing the universe had ever done for her.

In new situations, all the trickiest rules are the ones nobody bothers to explain to you. (And the ones you can't Google.)

You act like getting pregnant is a disease you can catch from public toilets.

The next night, Lincoln parked his Corolla right next to The Courier's front door. I'm here, he thought. Find me. Follow me. Make this inevitable.

Cath couldn't stop thinking about Levi and his ten thousand smiles.

I’d know you in the dark,” he said. “From a thousand miles away. There’s nothing you could become that I haven’t already fallen in love with.

Baz. "Have you ever done this before?" Simon. "Yes. No." "Yes or no?" "Yes. Not like this." Baz. "Not with a boy?" Simon. "Not when I really wanted it.

The strange thing about seeing someone for first time in nine years is the way they look totally different, just for a second, a split second, and then they look at you the way they always have, as if no time has passed between you.

You think I'm cute?" He said thinkly, pulling on her hand. She was glad he couldn't see her face. "I think you're..." Beautiful. Breathtaking. Like the person in a Greek myth who makes one of the gods stop caring about being a god.

Nothing before you counts," he said. "And I can't even imagine an after." She shook her head. "Don't." "What?" "Don't talk about after." "I just meant that... I want to be the last person who ever kisses you, too.... That sounds bad, like a death threat or something. What I'm trying to say is, you're it. This is it for me.

There was something about the music on that tape. It felt different. Like, it set her lungs and her stomach on edge. There was something exciting about it, and something nervous. It made Eleanor feel like everything, like the world, wasn't what she'd thought it was. And that was a good thing. That was the greatest thing.

Well, at first, I was sure that he would feel the cosmic forces pulling us together. I wanted him so badly, I could feel my heart racing for him with every beat. It was destiny. "He was a magnet and I was steel.

My girlfriend is sad and quiet and keeps me up all night worrying about her.

You think that holding someone hard will bring them closer. You think that you can hold them so hard that you'll still feel them, embossed on you, when you pull away. Every time Eleanor pulled away from Park, she felt the gasping loss of him.

It's our last chance. No. No, I can't... I, no, I need to believe that it isn't our last chance... Eleanor? Can you hear me? I need you to believe it, too.

Do you feel like he ignores you?" "No. I feel like he doesn't see me.

We're going to listen music in my room.' 'Fine,' his dad said from underneath the sink. 'Just don't get anybody pregnant.

Holding Eleanor's hand was like holding a butterfly. Or a heartbeat. Like holding something complete, and completely alive.

It’s just … everything. There are too many people. And I don’t fit in. I don’t know how to be. Nothing that I’m good at is the sort of thing that matters there. Being smart doesn’t matter—and being good with words. And when those things do matter, it’s only because people want something from me. Not because they want me.

You flirt with old people and babies and everybody in between.

But there's nothing more profound than creating something out of nothing.

Why are they doing that?” his mother said, frowning at her grandsons. The boys were sorting the casserole into piles on their plates. “Doing what?” Eve asked. “Why aren’t they eating their food?” “They don’t like it when things touch,” Eve said. “What things?” his mother asked. “Their food. They don’t like it when different foods touch or mix together.” “How do you serve dinner, in ice cube trays?

Maybe Park had paralyzed her with his ninja magic, his Vulcan handhold, and now he was going to eat her. That would be awesome.

His parents never talked about how they met, but when Park was younger, he used to try to imagine it. He loved how much they loved each other. It was the thing he thought about when he woke up scared in the middle of the night. Not that they loved him--they were his parents, they had to love him. That they loved each other. They didn't have to do that.

I don't want you to go," Sam said. She was upset. "I don't want this to end like this." "You don't get to choose," Lincoln said. "It's just happening.

I know that people change. I thought... I thought we're going to change together. I thought that's what it meant to be in love.

I just had this feeling about you," she said. "Is that foolish?" "I hope not.

All through first and second and third hour, Eleanor rubbed her palm. Nothing happened. How could it be possible that there were that many never ending all in one place? And were they always there, or did they just flip on wherever they felt like it? Because, if they were always there, how did she manage to turn doorknobs without fainting? Maybe this was why so many people said it felt better to drive a stick shift.

high school guys only appear hot to high school girls. its something to do with the fluorescent lighting in the classrooms, i think. They're actually really skinny and spotty, and they have giant feet

Months are different in college, especially freshman year. Too much happens. Every freshman month equals six regular months—they're like dog months.

You always ask that. Why. Like there's an answer for everything. Not everybody has your life, you know, or your family. In your life, things happen for reasons. People make sense. But that's not my life. Nobody in my life makes sense.

Why are you lying awake, thinking that you're a terrible person? To keep my mind occupied when I can't sleep. Some people count sheep. I self-loathe.

Then Park reached up and wrapped one of her red curls around his honey finger. "Back to missing you," he said, letting it go.

Things she knew now, that she hadn't known two hours ago: Park was covered with skin. Everywhere.

Looks like somebody's got jungle fever.' 'That's not even the right kind of racist.

The worst thing about the internet, as far as Greg's bosses were concerned, was that it was now impossible to distinguish a roomful of people working diligently from a roomful of people taking the What-Kind-of-Dog-Am-I? online personality quiz

The only dating advice I have to offer is: Expect the guys in your life to be kind and respectful. Don't make excuses for garbagey behavior-'Oh, that's just what guys are like.' It isn't true. Expect them to be good, treat them like they're good. And if they're garbagey, move on. Don't let your world get cluttered up with people who think they have some gender-based right to be awful.

Ophelia was bonkers, right? And Juliet was what, a sixth-grader?

What did he have to mope about, really? What more did he want?...Love. Purpose. Those are the things that you can't plan for. Those are the things that just happen. And what if they don't happen? Do you spend your whole life pining for them? Waiting to be happy?