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101 " He didn't want to read the newspaper or listen to the radio anymore. He didn't want to be a grown-up. There are some people who are just no good at it. "
― Heather O'Neill , The Lonely Hearts Hotel
102 " Rose had grown up in a room filled with sixty other girls. She was used to the intimacy of other female bodies. When a girl reached out a hand to her, Rose always instinctively grabbed it. Poppy was not used to touching other women. Poppy was that strange thing: an only child. "
103 " The moon was full. It looked like a breast engorged with milk because of all the babies crying in the night. "
― Heather O'Neill , When We Lost Our Heads
104 " You've been a naughty kit-kat. Silly bad thing. Dirty raggedy scamp. You'll go straight to hell,' said Rose.'Yes. You've been bad and whiny. You don't get milk. No milk at all. No milk one bit. No milk for you.,' insisted Pierrot.''If you cry, I'm going to poke you in the nose.''Owww! Owww! Owww! I don't want to hear it.'You smell bad. You have to scrub your paws. Bath time. Stinky creep.''Naughty sinner, naught, naughty, naughty. With mud for paws.''Soooo shameful. Look at me. Mister Shameful.'They had never been taught words of affection. Although the two had only known harsh terms and words of discipline, they had managed to transform them into words of love. "
105 " • Many of the women were breastfeeding, as they wanted to make sure the children were silent while Mary was talking. "
106 " What happened if an unwanted child gave birth to an unwanted child? It was as though she were in a hall of mirrors, except that instead of getting smaller in each one, she got younger and younger. "
107 " What the hell is that?" he asked."Magic mushrooms.""I've always wanted to try those," he exclaimed. "They sound so cute. "
― Heather O'Neill , Lullabies for Little Criminals
108 " All children are really orphans. At heart, a child has nothing to do with its parents, its background, its last name, its gender, its family trade. It is a brand-new person, and it is born with the only legacy that all individuals inherit when they open their eyes in this world: theinalienable right to be free. "
109 " When you are born and put into your crib, the whole world sticks their heads over the tops of the bars. They give you a name and they have all sorts of different ideas about you.…But your task is to become something much more unique and surprising than anyone your parents could ever imagine you to be. You have to know that the life you have is completely yours. "
― Heather O'Neill , The Girl Who Was Saturday Night
110 " Love is like this small room where a child brings you to show you all their treasures. First the child shows you all the new toys that are bright and shiny and top of the line. But then she shows you all the stuff that has ended up at the bottom of the trunk. There are dolls with eyes that wobble, hair that is falling out of their heads, and dirt behind their ears. Their fingertips have been chewed off by dogs and they have been drawn on with ballpoint pen. It has been so long since they have been held or anyone has told them that they are lovely. They lie at the bottom of the toy chest, hidden and ashamed. You are either going to be disgusted by them, or you are going to be so filled with love for them that your heart almost breaks.I took his hand in mine. "
111 " I'm a terrible person,' Pierrot said to her.'I'm quite wicked too', Rose said, and she smiled at him.Pierrot knew that Rose was punished every time she spoke to him. All her words were contraband, treasured items from the black market. A sentence from her was like a pot of jam during wartime. "
112 " If they wanted to have time to read a book in the evenings, that was as important as any of Napoleon’s ambitions. Because what a triumph it was for any woman to have time for herself—and to be able to do something that benefitted her imagination alone. "
113 " The cat looked at its paws and frantically back at its body, as if it had just been transformed into a cat and couldn't accept it. "
114 " The female body was particularly absorbent when it came to shame. If you wrung out any woman’s body, you would discover it was soaked in shame. "
115 " But your task is to become something much more unique and surprising than anyone your parents could ever imagine you to be. You have to know that the life you have is completely yours. "
116 " At night the monsters under the beds begged him to come make love to them. "
117 " All life began underneath the ocean. So I'm giving people a taste of what existence might have been like before civilization.''But we were amoebas and tiny shrimplike creatures. We didn't start off in deep-sea-diving outfits.''We all come into this world with an oxygen tube in our belly button.''True.'She put her hands up to her own belly. There had so recently been a sea creature evolving in there, trying its best to get its act together. It had perished under the deep, deep, deep sea. "
118 " She was as secure as a sixty-year-old woman whose husband has never cheated on her. "
119 " What city doesn’t like to brag about itself? The gargoyle fauns leaned off the front of the buildings, whispering about their sex lives. The fat catfish in the greenhouse swore they had stock market tips. The horses on the carousel reared their heads, ready for a battle against the mermaid statues in the pond. An electric train rode around and around a tiny mountain in the toy-shop window, while its Lilliputian passengers dreamed in tiny berths. "
120 " You came out of prison incredibly buff or with an addiction to paperback novels. "