When We Were Worthy Quotes
"One thing everyone agreed on—it was the perfect night for football."
"But it wasn’t summer anymore. It was fall. And fall meant football in Worthy."
"We imagine that night just keeps going on forever, and we guess that, in some ways, it does."
"But come November 1, the dress was the first thing she’d taken down, almost as ready to have it gone as her neighbors were."
"But the fight had gone out of her the moment she heard Graham was hurt."
"This town wasn’t prone to what one would call gracious winning."
"She’d let things get out of hand tonight at the game, and they’d been spotted."
"Life in Worthy looked nothing like their life before."
"This town was too small, the gossip traveled too fast."
"But no one was more surprised than she when the villagers—who turned out to be other students—also got down on their knees and bowed their heads."
"Her heart seized at the thought: So who was watching last night?"
"The closer she got to the hospital, the more ill she became."
"All the things that used to be worth expressing had been stolen from her."
"What had she been doing buying that child clothes for a job interview and missing Mary Claire’s game?"
"She wanted to hurt in a tangible way, so she kept pursing her lips and tightly gripping the wheel."
"You’re going to have to find your own way home."
"Because I could not stop for Death, he kindly stopped for me."
"In Worthy, truth lived right next door to perception, but they weren’t exactly friendly neighbors."
"To be a light shining in the darkness. It’s a mission field, is what it is."
"She could see those three girls, now all dead, how the way she’d hurt him had perhaps died with them, absolving her."
"People lingered after the service, their faces serious and sad."
"Once, when she and Brynne and Keary and Mary Claire had been sleeping over at Brynne’s house, she’d told them all about it."
"She didn’t want to be serious, to talk about this with him or anyone."
"In the wake of tragedy—she looked just gorgeous."
"And yet, he hadn’t stooped to it, and his temporary digs had become his de facto home."
"There is no going home. There is no home to go to. This is it."
"You don’t get it. There is no going home. There is no home to go to. This is it."
"Ruining one more life won’t bring those girls back."
"No jury is going to convict a bright young man who had an accident."
"I haven’t really known you since we came here."
"I need you of all people to believe me. I know the way it looks—I do—but if you’ll give me time, I’ll prove that I didn’t do what they’re saying."
"My father warned me you were too young for me."
"So I guess that’s why you went after some kid?"
"But this was a fall she couldn’t save him from. She just stood by and watched from the front picture window until all four cars had disappeared from sight."
"I’m OK. I mean, it wasn’t the greatest day of my life, and I’m contemplating moving to Florida to live with my mother and maiden aunt, but..."
"She knew of one teenage boy who was currently lying his ass off to save his own neck—after having been told to do so by his own mother."
"What if she was telling the truth, and all of this had been a rush to judgment?"
"For a brief moment today, she’d had the thought—just a flicker, but still, it had been there—that maybe it would’ve been better if he had."
"He paused, as if to let her respond, but she didn’t speak, so he continued."
"Needing and being needed: as far as she could tell, it was the circle of life, an endless, dizzying loop."
"She could still remember the blisters they rubbed between her toes."
"Everything was something lovely once, something to behold."
"Because it was only after the world got to it that it became too worn to appreciate anymore."
"Her china-blue eyes were red rimmed and swollen, the tears pulling ahead of the anger in the emotional race she’d just finished."
"The sanctity of her home, the peace of her life, whatever she’d managed to cling to before, was gone."
"She was a horrible person for feeling relief at the thought. She was a horrible person for living when they were dead."
"Because no matter what happened from here on out, her mother would not be able to stop something terrible from happening to her."
"That was living, she told herself—being afraid and excited all at once, buzzing from the beer, not knowing what was next."
"She could still feel it there, fingers forever tapping on her front door saying, Let me in."
"These days she had no idea what she’d be when she grew up. These days growing up looked like less and less fun than it had when she was younger."
"But it was a place no one could follow. She knew that kind of leaving; she’d done it herself, but not in a good way."
"By the time Talmadge was finished, tears were leaking from her eyes, and she knew that she would tell him the truth about the night of the accident."
"She began to feel like the last person on earth."
"Love is a renewable resource. The more you give, the more you have."
"It's better to be the hammer than the anvil."
"You didn’t have to be scared of you showing love to someone else, of you helping other people."
"What happened to you, Mom? You used to do things. You used to take action."
"Power to take an ax to that column, to crumble the house around all of their ears."
"In that look were a thousand unsaid words—words about pain and secrets, about judgment and fear."
"She thought of her daughter up in heaven, orchestrating outcomes there much the same as she had here."
"I understand more than you know. And I'm here. If you need me."
"Truth is so rare that it is delightful to tell it."
"All kids are good for is breaking your heart."
"There're just some things we can't make right, but I guess we can try."
"You remember when we saw each other at the church the first time, at the funeral?"
"I felt like you were the one good thing I had left, and in that moment, he took it away somehow."
"It took me years to wreck our marriage. And it'll take me years to rebuild it. But I intend to try."
"Thank you for trusting me enough to tell me. I’m not sure I deserved it. But I’m going to try to, in the future. I want to always be someone you can come to. OK?"
"Each time she told the story, she felt lighter, and stronger after."
"By telling her story, she could stop one more heart from breaking. She would not live in vain."
"Wearing her clothes gave her the courage she needed to be someone different than she’d been in the past—someone braver and stronger."
"My mom is my hero. And though I’ve never told her this, someday I hope I get the chance to be like her."
"Sometimes the anger over the unfairness of it all shook Marglyn so hard her teeth rattled in her head."
"And that, someday, I hope to be just like her."
"She stood up and collected her purse and her car keys. She got in her car and drove, stopping by Trout’s for a bouquet of flowers along the way, making the drive out to the cemetery as she often did, especially now that her dreams of her daughter had come to an end."
"We are in the breeze that has just a hint of fall crispness to it. We are in the music the band plays, the voices raised in elation or despair, the thud of bodies colliding on the field. We are all around, still as much a part of the town as we were before."