Staying Fat For Sarah Byrnes Quotes
"His looks aren’t anything," I said back. "And he left them for me."
"You look a lot better than your dad," she said. "He was compulsive, ate all the time. You’re big and solid. That’s different."
"Big and solid as twelve pounds of mashed potatoes in an eight-pound bag," I said.
"And you have a much better sense of humor than your father," she said.
"Tweech his own," I said, and pirouetted to tippy-toe out of the room.
"I can’t figure exactly how you’re put together inside," she says.
"If darkness closes in or you hear the voice of God, come up."
"Good job, Mobe," Coach hollers from across the pool. "You’ll never be extinct with that attitude."
"Every time you let somebody take your stuff, or let them see you hurt, you get killed."
"If you put one more empty container anywhere but in the garbage, I’ll have you put to sleep."
"I wasn’t putting myself down, sir. I was just telling the truth."
"The world doesn’t provide any place safe for her. Every day when she gets up, she knows she has to bring her scarred-up face to school, knowing what everyone thinks and won’t say. There’s no place to hide and it never lets up. I’d call that a bad place to live."
"You have to always think about survival, Eric. Trust me."
"That means it explodes easy. You better not mess with it."
"I mean it’s not a real newspaper. I was there the day you did the tobacco. Really, it was pretty neat. Nobody else would have had the guts…"
"You’re a jock who doesn’t compete in his best sport, a student who doesn’t excel where his aptitude is highest, and you surround yourself with a supporting cast straight out of ‘The Far Side.’"
"For my sake, Sarah Byrnes, this better work."
"This is so much BS! People throw out this line of crap for one reason: so they can do whatever they darn well please. It’s a bogus way of not having to be accountable to God."
"Virgil Byrnes really is a scary dude. He’s one of those shadowy people you can’t imagine ever having been a kid."
"I stand against the back desk, trying hard to fade into the background."
"That may sound a bit dramatic, but I wanna tell you, Sarah Byrnes’s pappy gives me maximum creeps."
"I sat at the keyboard, chin propped in one hand, feeding myself nonstop Lorna Doones with the other, a major writer’s block shrouding me like the stench around Elgin Greene."
"I think we oughta do an ex-pose on that little rat Elgin Greene."
"I’m aware I’ve known Ellerby almost four years and I know almost nothing about his family."
"If only it were true. What do you want, Mobe?"
"It’s the one thing I do in life that gets results."
"We’re all born into different situations, but the word of God is the word of God and everyone has to adhere to it."
"But what if I’m not fat? Will you still be my friend?"
"I’ve always tried to stay cool when it comes to matters of the heart."
"I stand dazed in front of my locker, having forgotten where my next class is, or what it is, for that matter."
"I think Dale Thornton lives in a very scary part of town."
"You can’t imagine the emptiness. There’s a piece that isn’t getting talked about in class."
"You can’t separate me from my actions. A man is known by his works."
"I wanted to tell Brittain that Lemry was trying to tell him that his own little view of the universe wasn’t the only view possible."
"I’ll have to answer to the school board. I’m too close to retirement for that. Don’t ever get it in your head that I care."
"I needed to have a serious talk with my mother before it’s too late."
"I find Lemry folding towels near the clothes dryer back behind the lockers."
"I can’t ever go home again. My dad is getting crazier, and like I said the other day, there’s nothing too mean for him to do if he thinks he needs to."
"I feel worse for their lives than I do for my own, except I wish I could hide my scars on the inside like them."
"I know I’m not the only one in the world who hurts, or even the person who hurts the worst."
"I was pretty, Eric. I was pretty. People said that."
"It’s hard to stay mean when you remember how that feels."
"I owe these kids a lot. Sometime before I leave I’ll have to talk because I need to tell them they’ve made things better for me."
"There’s only one way she can help me now, and that’s to come back and tell the truth—and put that son of a bitch away."
"Once I know something, I can’t unknow it or pretend it isn’t so. I’m responsible for anything I know."
"My momma always wanted to be a singer or a dancer or some shit like these chicks she seen in Reno once, up on the stage at some gamblin’ place."
"Taking on someone else’s monsters will kill you."
"I wish adults could know how important that is to us sometimes."
"Sometimes I look at pictures of me back then, and I can't believe the monumental sadness in those eyes."
"I knew I was the very worst hitter on the team and the very worst fielder. But I didn't care, because I had a new glove and a green-and-gold uniform and I belonged."
"Just that quick I didn't belong, and I remember thinking something always has to spoil it."
"You just have to tell the truth in a way people recognize."
"I’m not asking for acquittal, or even leniency, but I am asking for fairness."
"Boy, ain't it a trip where heroes come from."