Certain Girls Quotes
"The worst thing would be if they did it to your daughter."
"Beauty clears your path, it smooths the way, it holds the doors open, it makes people forgive you when your homework's late or you bring the car home with the gas gauge on E."
"I don't trust happiness. I turn it over as if it were a glass at a flea market or a rug at a souk, looking for chipped rims or loose threads."
"My chest plus Bruce's skinny hips and lean legs combined to create the kind of body I always figured was available only thanks to divine or surgical intervention."
"Joy is lovely and lucky. And in the manner of almost-thirteen-year-olds everywhere, my daughter has no idea how lovely, or how lucky, she is."
"Things are good. But maybe they could be even better. It wouldn't kill us to try something new."
"I don't know whether he was trying to fuck me or erase me!"
"Every heartbreak serves a purpose, and it all works out in the end."
"I'll never forget the day I found out my girlfriend weighed more than I did."
"All of that sex stuff paid for your summer vacations."
"Who wouldn't want a Doctor Who alien invader bloodbath bat mitzvah?"
"Your mom has lots of nice clothes, all in dry cleaner's plastic at the back of her closet, left over from her book tours."
"I want to go for a family hike--two miles up, then two miles back, with a stop to feed the ducks in between."
"The truth is, even staying this size requires a Herculean effort that will end the minute I take my vows."
"I never knew my father / it doesn't really matter / that's all there is to that."
"Parents could just drop out of your life like loose teeth."
"The most important rule of fashion is 'Know yourself.'"
"No big deal, I wrote on my Post-it as Alden kept talking."
"Water under the bridge. Look forward, not back."
"I could write StarGirl novels. I could work, contribute, keep busy, and do it all without the world finding out, or paying any attention."
"Let the dead bury their dead was what I thought, which didn't make sense when I said it any more than it had when Jesus did, given that neither my father nor I was dead, but still, it was what I thought, and it comforted me somehow."
"I promised. And so what if I had my fingers crossed behind my back?"
"I don't answer the telephone unless I recognize the number. I don't answer the door unless I'm expecting guests."
"My father disappeared again. I didn't hear from him again after that August, and I never tried to find him--not online, not in real time."
"My father, my constant companion all through my twenties and into my thirties, had an easy death when Joy was four."
"I don't update my website. I don't answer fan mail. I don't do blurbs or book-club visits."
"In a few years, or maybe even a few months, she'd find other clients and make them big-money deals. Other books would move to the best-seller list."
"We were together for seven years, and even had a commitment ceremony, before Tanya left her for a male plumber she'd met at a weekend retreat for mindful eating."
"She ran one hand through her spiky hair, turned back to her pantry, and pulled out another jar. She held it at arm's length, squinting."
"If there's ever anything you want to ask me about, or talk to me about, you know that I'm here."
"I love you, Joy," she said, her voice cracking, and I winced at how completely sappy it was...and how my eyes filled when she said it.
"Parents make mistakes," she said. "I did, and your mother did, and you will, too. But I can promise you that everything your mother did was with your best interests at heart."
"Going through life with your heart outside your body."
"You get extra time if your mother falls in love with a woman she meets in a hot tub at the JCC."
"You know what you should wear? That red dress you wore to the premiere of Maxi's movie."
"The allure of the unknown," my mother said. "It's like with junk food or Disney princesses. The more you tell a kid she can't have something, the more she wants it."
"Listen," I said at last, addressing the blank surface of the door. "If you want to meet him--your grandfather--then I'll try to find him. If it's important to you, then that's what we'll do."
"You were the thing I was running to. I just didn't know it yet."
"When you get everything you wanted, I think maybe you do have to be a little grateful for the people who got you there...whether or not they thought they were doing you any favors at the time."
"I will love you forever. I will keep you safe."
"I'm okay," she said. "I just want to make sure you knew about my bat mitzvah. You know. Officially."
"I don't know. I feel weird that I don't feel any weirder. Does that make sense?"
"I thought you might like seeing this," he said.
"I'm here by myself," I said. "I don't want to bother you or anything, but I'd really, really appreciate any information you have about my grandfather."
"Don't ask that if you don't want the answer."
"Dishes, mostly. And I listen to people, if they want to talk."
"You're scaring everyone. Wake up. Come home."
"The moral is, eat whatever you want, because it doesn't fucking matter. You're gonna die anyhow."
"You get what you get, and you don't get upset."