The Girl Who Stopped Swimming Quotes
"Until the drowned girl came to Laurel’s bedroom, ghosts had never walked in Victorianna."
"It looks like Barbie’s Dream House threw up in here."
"A thin finger of moonlight came through the bullet hole left of his center, reaching to touch Laurel’s eye and help her lids come shuddering down."
"You say something nice," Laurel said, putting one hand over the swell of her abdomen.
"The stuffed pony Laurel had loved best was still allowed a place at the end of her bed, but Marty was not reflected in its glass eyes, as if her loyal pony doll refused to acknowledge his presence."
"This place is a hole where your brains used to be."
"Laurel saw her quilts complete in her mind’s eye, and she knew every piece—innocent, macabre, or neutral as beige velvet—must be subject to the larger pattern."
"I didn’t mean leave," Laurel said, standing up and taking two cautious steps after her. "I meant you can’t be here."
"Her heart was swelling, taking up too much room in her chest, compressing her lungs so that she couldn’t get a breath as she ran."
"It went on for a long time like that. By the time Laurel heard the sirens, the pebbled tiles were tiny scissors clipping at her knees each time she shifted."
"A farmer was putting out the food and, every now and again, setting a trap and having rabbit supper."
"Mother would not want to hear that Molly Dufresne had walked through walls to visit Laurel’s bedroom."
"I never yet saw a dissection that did the worm a speck of good."
"A tragedy, but it’s all over, and the faster things go back to normal, the better for Shelby."
"Mother had a beautiful lie at the ready, horses and acrobats to soothe and distract."
"You have to ask what happened in her house to drive her from it. It’s almost always people in a family who kill each other."
"You’re getting to look exactly like your mother. I never noticed till now."
"The worst part wasn’t the nasty undercurrent in his voice. It wasn’t even that she’d loved him her whole life. The worst part was that a piece of her had a hard time not looking."
"She knew the real word now. She’d seen it months ago in one of Mother’s Reader’s Digests. The real word was 'complicit.'"
"Mother had let Laurel have friends over with Marty there, knowing."
"It was a good story, but Laurel couldn’t claim it as her own."
"You want me to make them like me? Or do you want to make me like them?"
"I’m not playing. A child is going in the ground soon, and Shelby loved her. Shelby’s not herself."
"We will find him out, and we will make him sorry."
"Shelby’s blaming herself, because if she had come, she and Molly would be famous actresses or hookers in New York by now."
"She’d come back with her sister and then stood off to one side. Laurel had held his hand, squeezing so hard she felt his bones grinding."
"Her words must have echoed in the space between their beds for hours, growing louder."
"She could feel a wedge of sweltering Florida air shoving its way through the open door into her keeping room."
"You are brave, little tin soldier. But you may not know everything I know, either."
"I bet I can pick him up in two. Either way, we can cross him off the list and look where we need to be looking. It’s always the family."
"I think that Shelby feels crushed and watched and stifled, so they were meeting up in the yard to hit the road."
"She’d rallied, cursing her sister as she pushed Shelby out into the world."
"Words forged connections in the brain, and then the body followed."
"I saw some hair glowing in the dark, and that makes you think it was me?"
"Don't be afraid. Whatever it is, Bet, you can tell me."
"I never yet saw a dissection that did the worm a bit of good."
"You need to pull yourself together, go upstairs, and reassure your child."
"I see that color when I talk to other math people like Kaitlyn. I don't see her. Not like I see you."
"You're paying for my damn window," Stan said.
"Give my sister any crap about this, and a zipper mask will be the least of it," Thalia said to them, unfurling her widest smile.
"Your Shelby? Why would your kid be here?" Stan Webelow said. He looked from Laurel to David, and then his lip curled under. "You’re twisted. She’s a child."
"Your creepy guy is creepy all right," Thalia said. "But I’m afraid he’s your basic garden-variety whore."
"I feel ill," Trish said. She was trying to tie her shoelaces, but her hands were shaking.
"What are you doing?" Stan was trying to push his way around David. David stayed in his path.
"I have to stop doing this," Thalia said. She looked, in that moment, as young and lost as Shelby.
"We waited for whatever would rise out of the water to rise."