Quotes by Laurie Halse Anderson

I am beginning to measure myself in strength, not pounds. Sometimes in smiles.

Why?’ She nods. ‘She had everything: a family who loved her, friends, activities. Her mother wants to know why she threw it all away?’ Why you want to know why? Step into a tanning booth and fry yourself for two or three days. After your skin bubbles and falls off, roll in coarse salt, then put on long underwear woven from spun glass and razor wire. Over that goes your regular clothes, as long as they are tight. Smoke gunpowder and go to school to jump through hoops, sit up and beg, and roll over on command. Listen to the whispers that curl into your head at night, calling you ugly and fat and stupid and bitch and whore and worst of all ‘A disappointment.’ Puke and starve and cut and drink because you need an anesthetic and it works. For a while. But then the anesthetic turns into poison and by then it’s too late because you are mainlining it now, straight into your soul. It is rotting you and you can’t stop. Look in a mirror and find a ghost. Hear every heartbeat scream that everythingsinglething is wrong with you. ‘Why?’ is the wrong question. Ask ‘Why not?

The smoke shifted direction and I breathed in. Breathed out. On the inhale I was angry. On the exhale…there it was again. Fear. The fear made me angry and the anger made me afraid and I wasn’t sure who he was anymore. Or who I was.

I could never hate you, even if I wanted to.

I breathe in slowly. Food is life. I exhale, take another breath. Food is life. And thats the problem. When youre alive, people can hurt you. Its easier to crawl into a bone cage or a snowdrift of confusion. Its easier to lock everybody out. But its a lie.

I have never heard a more eloquent silence.

Yes it is, because you can only be brave if youre scared.

Why do you have such a crappy attitude about math?I dont. I have a crappy attitude about everything.

I’d given him bits and pieces of my peculiar life, but colored softer and funnier than they had been. I’d painted my dad as Don Quixote in a semi, on a quest for philosophical truths and the best cup of coffee in the nation.

IT happened. There is no avoiding it, no forgetting. No running away, or flying, or burying, or hiding.

I want to be in fifth grade again. Now, that is a deep dark secret, almost as big as the other one. Fifth grade was easy -- old enough to play outside without Mom, too young to go off the block. The perfect leash length.

There is something about Christmas that requires a rug rat. Little kids make Christmas fun. I wonder if could rent one for the holidays. When I was tiny we would by a real tree and stay up late drinking hot chocolate and finding just the right place for the special decorations. It seems like my parents gave up the magic when I figured out the Santa lie. Maybe I shouldnt have told them I knew where the presents really came from. It broke their hearts.

Grandma frowned and yelled something in Russian. She could have been saying, Open up, your best friend is here. On the other hand, it could have been, America is a great country because of canned ravioli.

The trick to surviving an interrogation is patience. Don’t offer up anything. Don’t explain. Answer the question and only the question that is asked so you don’t accidentally put your head in a noose.

The night sky stretched on forever above me, the stars flung like glass beads and pearls on a black velvet cloak.

I wont take a real nap. I have this halfway place, a rest stop on the road to sleep, where I can stay for hours. I dont even need to close my eyes, just stay safe under the covers and breathe.

I drift into the armpits of strangers, tasting their manic salt, and sleep to forget everything.

I can see us, living in the woods, her wearing that A, me with a S maybe, S for silent, S for stupid, for scared. S for silly. For shame.

I cant do everything for you. You must walk alone to find your soul.

Its easier to floss with barbed wire than admit you like someone in middle school.