Quotes by Nina LaCour

My best friend is dead, and I could have saved her. It’s so wrong so completely and painfully wrong, that I walked through my front door tonight smiling.

I wish I knew why she never told me any of this. Maybe she thought I wouldnt be able to handle it, that I was too sheltered or too innocent or something. If she had told me why she cut herself all the time, or that it was the pills that made her act so spaced out, or that she was even on pills, or even saw doctors, or any of it, I would have done my best to help her. Im not saying Im a superhero. Im not saying I would have just swooped down and saved her. Im just saying the only reason everything was a waste was that she made it a waste. That whole time, back when I was just a normal kid in high school, living out my normal life, I really thought everything mattered.

When the bell rings, and lunch is over, I decide to come back here tomorrow, and the next day. I tell myself it really isn’t that bad.

When you live in LA and work in the movies, you experience the collapse of some of that fantasy. You know that the eyes glow like that because of lights placed at a specific angle, and you see the actresses up close and, yes, they are beautiful, but they are human size and imperfect like the rest of us.

Dignity is overrated. You know what trumps dignity? Kissing.

I sleep through the next day. Each time I go to the bathroom, I try not to look in the mirror. Once, I catch my reflection: it looks like I’ve been punched in both eyes.I can’t talk about the day that follows that.

This was me before I knew about anything hard, when my whole life was packed lunches and art projects and spelling quizzes.

I cant muster a smile. Even with the knowledge that its dark outside and light up here, its hard to believe that he can see us. We should be invisible. We are so alone. Mabel and I are standing side by side, but we cant even see each other. In the distance are the lights of town. People must be finishing their workdays, picking up their kids, figuring out dinner. Theyre talking to one another in easy voices about things of great significance and things that dont mean much. The distance between us and all of that living feels insurmountable.

We felt so small with the city lights stretching forever below us, and we yelled at the top of our lungs because we were just these small humans but we felt more longing than could ever fit inside us.

We take a last look out of the window at the night, and I send a silent wish to everyone out there for this kind of warmth.

It isnt the happy ending that Ingrid and I have dreamed up, but its all a part of what Im working through. The way life changes. The way people and things disappear. Then appear, unexpectedly, and had you close

Im sorry I left without telling you, she says. I wasnt ready. I wanted it so much, and I wasnt ready for that.

I leaned over the sink, closer to my reflection, and stare at myself hard. I dont know what I see. I dont even know what I want to see.

We were nostalgic for a time that wasnt yet over.

Youve never told him, Violet says. Its not a question. Its obvious.I tell him all the time - I just make sure its never when hes listening. I say it when hes in the other room, or when hes asleep, or when the musics really loud. Sometimes he asks me what I just said. And I tell him never mind. Or I make up something else, something that isnt I love you.

I hate that word. Straight. At the very least, those of us who are nonstraight should get called curvy. Or scenic. Actually, I like that: Do you think shes straight? Oh no. Shes scenic

...I think that people who make judgements about other people they dont even know are shallow, and people who start rumors are shallow, and I really dont care what shallow people say about me.

Its the opposite of the collapse of the fantasy.Its what happens when the illusion pales in comparison to the truth. Im seeing her for the first time. Not Ava Garden Wilder, the rags-to-riches granddaughter of Clyde Jones. Not a tragic, romantic heroine. Just Ava.And I am utterly in love.

Dont you want to kiss me? she asks.She smiles just a little, a hopeful, sweet smile, but buried in it is that confidence that slays me.

We love films because they makes us feel something. They speak to our desires, which are never small. They allow us to escape and to dream and to gaze into the eyes that are impossibly beautiful and huge. They fill us with longing. But also. they tell us to remember; they remind us of life. Remember, they say, how much it hurts to have your heart broken.