Peaches Quotes
"Every spring since she had turned thirteen had started the same way for Murphy McGowen. She started feeling restless at the very same time as the crocuses began busting out of their buds every year."
"Murphy, who wasn’t much into nature, didn’t know why she liked it. In lots of ways it was a mess."
"The truth was, there was nothing she wanted to do. She wanted to float out of her body, out of Bridgewater, up to the moon."
"Murphy wasn’t surprised. It was typical. Boys came in one flavor. The flavor that couldn’t stand it when you didn’t let them play with your toys."
"Birdie was lying in her bed in a cookiefied stupor watching VH1. There was a fascinating show about eighties Hair Bands."
"Birdie had more cushioning there than she used to."
"Leeda watched the faces surrounding the table. Everyone, including her parents, shook their heads softly, agreeing with her, wearing amused expressions."
"Leeda was like David Hasselhoff. She was loved in Japan."
"Murphy dropped her bag and stuck her hands in the pockets of her cords, surveying the orchard. The house stood directly behind her."
"The Darlingtons and their orchard were perched on the edge of disaster, and Birdie didn’t even know it."
"I think she has more fun doing nothing than I ever do."
"How can you not like trees? That’s like not liking water, or the sun, or breathing."
"It’s never better to be forced out of something that’s your whole life."
"People didn’t know how to finish what they started."
"Saint Jude was the patron saint of lost causes."
"Life was chugging along, and Birdie had never even gotten on the track."
"She just didn’t know how to get out of herself."
"It’s like a nightmare garden—the kind a creepy old lady with a bunch of cats would have."
"Birdie’s body was graceless as she hauled and dragged whatever she could carry into the rows of trees. It was pure survival and clearly a losing battle."
"It was perhaps the saddest thing she’d ever seen in her life."
"Not everyone is as, um, strong…not everyone cares like you."
"It’s hard to get a sense from a photo, Walter, but Miss McGowen really outdid herself this time."
"It only blackened her mood. She was thinking it was typical. People didn’t know how to finish what they started."
"Life is not enough for her unless there’s some jerk around to treat her like crap."
"Being with my mom is like watching makeover TV."
"The difference between me and my mom, I guess, is that she gets used by all these guys. For me, it’s the other way around."
"Life was passing her by. Whatever had been building up in her didn’t disappear. It also didn’t explode. It stayed the same. But inside, Birdie felt like she expanded."
"New peaches no grow on old wood, you understand?"
"Doesn’t it seem like trees should be able to grow on their own, without all our help?"
"People want to believe they’re one thing and really they’re another."
"She didn’t have the sense that life was passing her by."
"For the first time in a long time, she didn’t have the sense that life was passing her by."
"The moment slipped away, but because it wasn’t perfect, it was the most perfect one she could remember having."
"You have to go after what you want. How do you expect to get it if you don’t?"
"I think anybody who has something good and wastes it is stupid."
"That’s a paltry offering. The Darlington Orchard is almost extinct."
"I’m just more than you. More person. More life."
"I plan to honor it this last time by swimming in it naked."
"I’m gonna end up like that lady in Jane Eyre."
"We can’t keep up with other farms with better equipment, more land, better connections to the grocery chains."
"I could have slid out of anything, usually by turning it on the person who’d accused me."
"I’m not gonna be like the lady in Jane Eyre, honey."
"It’s actually sad that you have to do so much for attention."
"You’re both the pettiest, most selfish people I ever met in my life!"
"I need you guys to get along. I need Leeda to come too."
"I’m sorry, honey, I really thought it would work this time with him. I guess I need to grow up."
"Are you gonna keep in touch with the girls from the orchard?"
"And I want to stay here. I don’t want to leave."