The Ruins Quotes
"If you're not careful, you can reach a point where you've made choices without thinking. Without planning. You can end up not living the life you'd meant to. Maybe one you deserve, but not one you intended."
"It's all right. You can borrow my hat, if you want."
"He wanted fifteen dollars to drive us somewhere else."
"Just go with it, sweetie. Okay? You'll see. It'll all work out."
"Hot as hell. You guys have a phrase like that? Everybody must, don't you think? Hades? Inferno?"
"He wanted to be the one Stacy whispered to, not the one she whispered about."
"It was the end stages of the slash-and-burn cycle: the wasteland that preceded the jungle’s return."
"He jumped backward, knocking Eric down, then lost his own footing and fell on top of him."
"He was going to teach children and remain a child forever."
"The warm water, the smell of shampoo, the little bar of soap in its paper wrapper, the clean towel waiting on its rack."
"They were hollow-chested, slope-shouldered, with knobby knees and elbows."
"He wasn’t certain how he was going to accomplish this; all he knew was that he wanted to get there."
"The two of them started back across the field, following in Pablo’s footsteps."
"It was a beautiful sight: a hill shaped like a giant breast, covered in red flowers."
"It was too hot to talk; all they could do was put one foot in front of the other."
"It was only when she stopped peering through the viewfinder that she noticed the gun on the man’s belt."
"But it was the sort of thing Eric and Stacy were best at: silliness, play."
"The sun was pouring its heat upon them—there was no shade anywhere."
"A mistake. Eric tried to think of other words that began with mis-, tried to remember what the prefix meant."
"Eric was growing a little less frightened with each step he took, and he was glad for this."
"It was a tent. Eric could see it clearly now as they climbed higher, a bright traffic-cone orange, looking a little worse for wear."
"This ought to have offered him at least a small sense of relief, but for some reason it didn’t. It had the exact opposite effect, in fact: it made him anxious."
"He wanted everything to make sense, to be predictable."
"Eric wondered briefly if they had the same root. Latin, he guessed. Which was yet another thing he ought to know but didn’t."
"He tried to picture the archaeologists, all of them laughing over this strange situation, which would turn out to be not so strange after all, once everything had been properly explained."
"Eric felt the impulse to look away, but this was silly, of course, a 'Don’t stare; it’s rude' reflex that had nothing to do with what was happening here."
"As soon as he’d heard the bald Mayan sending the bowmen running along the clearing, he’d known."
"Jeff knew that there was no point continuing down the hill—the man obviously wasn’t going to let them pass—but he couldn’t think of any other course to pursue."
"So he shrugged and waved them forward. 'We’ll see,' he said."
"Jeff was acting as if they were going to be here for some time, as if they were trapped here, and the idea filled her with panic."
"He wanted to help, wanted to stop Pablo’s screams, but he was stupid and useless and there was no way to change this."
"It felt good to be the one going, the one doing, and if he thought too long about the knots, about their apparent tenuousness, he knew he might end up changing his mind."
"We can’t leave him down there, Amy," he said. "You know that, don’t you? It’s not possible."
"We have to make a backboard before we can bring him up."
"The sun was beginning its implacable slippage toward the west."
"You were a lifeguard, weren't you? You ought to know how to handle this sort of thing."
"The windlass creaked and creaked as the rope slowly coiled around the barrel."
"He didn’t want to go, of course, was terrified of the idea, of dropping into the earth, into the darkness."
"She tried to remember what she and Eric had in their pack: a small bottle of water, a bag of pretzels, a can of mixed nuts, a pair of too-ripe bananas."
"Everything was ready, and they thought she was, too."
"But everything wasn’t going to be all right, of course."
"His eyes were clenched shut; there were beads of sweat standing on his forehead."
"He told Pablo of other accidents he’d witnessed."
"He kept hold of Pablo’s wrist with his right hand while he talked, squeezing sometimes to emphasize certain points, never letting go."
"When a siren sounded, people went to their front doors, stepped out onto their porches, shaded their eyes to see."
"They’d laugh about it later—tomorrow morning, when the Greek was up and limping about—how they’d jumped to their doomsday conclusion."
"The living did everything possible to sweep all evidence of it from sight."
"And it wasn’t possible, he knew. Nothing was going to be okay."
"I'm only trying to be careful, Amy. To be smart."
"He thought too much and too little, all at the same time."
"We have enough water for today. And it may rain, too."
"Always doing the practical thing, even when it’s pointless."
"We should put up a sign, I guess. Just to be safe."
"She was thrashing about in deep, deep water, trying to pretend all the while that this wasn’t true, and it was wearing her down—the thrashing, the pretending—she didn’t know how much longer she could keep it up."
"There was always something odd to feel if only you stopped and searched for it."
"We don’t need a latrine, even a well-made one. Sanitation isn’t high on their list of problems just now, and no matter what might happen to them here, they’d be gone long before it became an issue of any urgency."
"If it rains, we’ll have plenty of water. If it doesn’t, we’ll die of thirst."
"It’s not about knowing; it’s about not knowing. About the risk of waiting rather than acting."
"Fear made her passive, silent. She tended to cower and wait for bad things to pass her by."
"I’m not going to continue with this. I’ve offered my idea; what more could he do?"
"The sun, her hunger, they had nothing to do with it. What she was feeling was fear."