"Whatever I do has to mean something. I need to make something beautiful, something that lasts. I don't know what, but I have to, if I want my life to matter at all."
"Beautiful things are supposed to hurt."
"You could do anything to me and I'd let you."
"Tell me you love me, at least. Please. I need to know somebody does."
"They wanted each other in the way of flesh wanting to knit itself together over a wound."
"I kill them because they're beautiful, and it's the only way I can keep them."
"What a lonely, dreary thing it is to know the truth."
"I miss you to pieces. Yours always."
"He'd forgotten ever being angry. He felt gentle and endlessly patient; if Julian had asked, he would have happily cut his chest open and handed over his heart, his lungs, every part of himself piece by piece."
"I can't tell you how happy I am to see you" he said, and for a moment Paul couldn't imagine, much less remember, that anything in the world existed outside the two of them.
"Paul lay with his head on Julian's lap, trying to map constellations into the sun-darkened freckles on his knees, while Julian combed his fingertips gently through Paul's hair."
"They kissed each other breathless between each promise."
"They could only stitch themselves back together if they did something irreversible."
"Hard to trust you if you're going to maim me."
"The worst damage humans do isn't rooted in malice but in thoughtlessness."
"I know why you fuck me like you wish you could kill me."
"They were wild and delirious and invincible, and it was strange that no one else could see it."
"Familiar smells, familiar sounds, a life still marred by all its old fractures and disappointments."
"It was the first time he could believe Julian when he spoke this way, as if they were one mind, one heart, one pair of lungs."
"All I want to do is make you happy, and you're the unhappiest person I've ever met."
"I love you. By now you ought to be able to let me fucking tell you."